Do You Believe in Destiny?
by For A Key
Summary: This is the beginning of the end, the start of it all. The smoke rises above the fire of the crash, don't panic got no meaning here on this Island.
1. Chapter 1

**Do you believe in Destiny?**

This is the beginning of the end, the start of it all. The smoke rises above the fires of the crash, don't panic got no meaning here. What will happen, will they ever get off the Island? Or is there a reason they crashed just here…

An OC application story, from the beginning. What will your character do on the Island, explore, find a way to get off, join the others or find redemption?

Rescue will perhaps come sooner, who are those people on the freighter and are they there to rescue them – or kill them?

Right now, all I accept are characters from the fuselage, but as the story goes on I will soon start accepting freighter characters when the time has come. But right now, fill out this form. Be creative! Make a homicidal, insane and super cute character, or an old jock that never got over his high school years.

The form:

Name:

Nicknames:

Age:

Origin:

Connections (to other characters):

Appearance:

Personality (include good and bad sides):

Describe your character in three words:

Friends:

Enemies:

Love interest and belief in love:

Family:

Past (include why was in Sydney and why was going back to LA):

If your character was faced with the monster, what would they do?:

Do your character believe in Destiny?:

What is your character's favorite movie?:

Occupation:

Anything else?:


	2. Chapter 2

**I AM STILL ACCEPTING CHARACTERS! THE FORM IS IN THE FIRST CHAPTER.**

I have only gotten 6 characters submitted, and there has been some glitches in looking at the story/reviewing or read reviews, but hopefully it has gone away now. I am still, as you can see, accepting characters. Doesn't matter if you've already submitted one, do it again!

Current accepted characters:

**Claret Thimbleberry: **

For one, I am in love her last name and two: I started immediately to plot things when I read her description. It will be very fun to write her nervousness. Thank you!

**Bonnie McQueen:**

I'm not too comfortable with writing real life person's in fan fiction, so I will change her back story a bit. But don't worry; I will try to write her according to your suggestions and ideas, thank you for submitting her!

**Brian Haligan:**

Thank you for submitting him, I already got some good ideas coming up!

**Owen Chauncey:**

I am very much in love with your character! I can't wait to have her interact will all the others, thank you for submitting her!

**Lorraine Hume:**

This will be very interesting and fun to write, thank you so much for submitting a character! I love her connection to Desmond.

**Rosalie Alice Mills-Burton**

Thank you so much for such a detailed description and past, this will be a good challenge!

**Remember that I am still accepting OC's, please submit yours!**


	3. A Dream

_O God! can I not grasp  
Them with a tighter clasp?  
O God! can I not save  
One from the pitiless wave?_

Is all that we see or seem  
But a dream within a dream?

_- Dream Within a Dream by Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?**

**Chapter 1, A Dream**

--

There had never been so many sounds as in this moment, never had she felt so much - known so much. She could smell the thick smoke in her nose, feel the glass filled sand underneath her body and hear the panic that consumed the air.

Screams, shouts and cries, a screeching sound of something breaking, something exploding – something burning.

It could only mean one thing.

"How are you doing?"

"Splendid, it's not like I'm in the middle of a plane crash or anything!" Lorraine Hume answered, laying on the ground in the middle of the chaos, hearing everything that was going on. And recognizing that voice -

"Are you in shock? How many fingers am I holding up?" the man asked again, he was obviously some kind of moron.

"Seriously man, I'm the blind girl remember? Real smooth, you bumped into me! Now stop playing hero and get away from me!" Lorraine spat out, before slowly pulling herself up, she recognized the voice that had been speaking to her. That man she met at the airport, air, plane crash. She swallowed, and tried to fight back the urge to throw up. Swaying on the spot the supposed hero grabbed her arms.

"You need to get away from this chaos – c'mon, I'll help you,"

"No… no…"

She could feel it, the people that had died and the people that were dying.

"Someone else – someone else needs help you know," her voice got unsteady, she hated it. Leaning onto this man, her weakness.

"You need my help-" he protested.

"I'm not a bloody invalid!" she finally shouted, interrupting him, the screams were even higher, unbearable high. Someone shouted after a son, someone after a pen. Every second someone's life time ran out.

"JACK!" somebody shouted.

She shrugged him off, and started to feel her way away from the chaos. "Are you going to be all right?" Jack yelled after her as she disappeared into the smoke.

Lorraine was already too far away not hearing him as she struggled her way over debris, between screaming people and the hopeless tears. Her eyes wide open but unseeing, but still so aware of things around her.

She wasn't all right.

--

The moment the plane started to shake like crazy, Claret Thimbleberry thought that it was perhaps she who was shaking and not the plane, it had happened many times before. A stupid thought, but that was what she thought. She had often panicked over things, like when she spilled coffee over her homework as a child, when she accidentally made a sheep escape from the farm where she used to live or when she couldn't find her red fake nail. So that she now was panicking, wasn't a surprise.

When the front of the plane broke off, she panicked. When the bottom part broke off, she panicked even more. When her seat flew from the plane's middle part she thought she would actually going to die of fear.

When she woke up in the jungle alone with a dead body beside her, she realized that a plane crash wasn't the worst thing that could happen, it was what happened afterwards. So she panicked some more.

--

It was the most unorganized thing Rosalie Mills-Burton had ever seen, and it drove her mad. The people screaming, crying and running around like animals made her feel more lost than ever, the dead bodies and fires everywhere weren't helping either. She should help someone… she needed something, was that blood?

"He … Help…" she whimpered from the ground, people rushing by ignoring her pleads "Help… help me… please…" nobody came, she needed help – there was blood on her hands, she had to shout, where was Sawyer to save her?

"Sa… Sawyer…" she couldn't get out more than a silent whisper, he voice hoarse and tired.

It felt familiar, too familiar, the hopeless cry for help.

Tears fell down her face and she blinked, trying to fight away the memory of hands grabbing her.

"Sa… SAWYER! Please… someone… anyone… help…"

More chaos, more screams, something exploded - a big, red, fire ball up into the air.

Laughter, cruel laughter, Sawyer...

"Lalita…" she couldn't feel her legs.

Well, wasn't this just wonderful.

--

"Hell!" Margaret Tyler exclaimed out loud, clutching onto the now, ripped out plane seat. Getting up and looking delivered around at the turmoil. The heat from the flames slicked her feet, the people completely buried in a blurry chaos. It couldn't be true, not now, it was insane, a creepy very real insane dream.

"We need some help over here, you - come help!" a man in a suit yelled at her, trying to help some dude who' legs were stuck under some debris, screaming in agony over the heavy smoke. Slow, one step at a time she walked over there. With every step, her mind traveled back to reality.

"You help me hold this up okay?" he said, pointing at the debris. Margo simply stood there, trying to catch her breath.

"WE WERE IN A PLANE CRASH!" she cried, but here scream was being swallowed by the chaotic sounds everywhere around her.

"I know that –" he put a hand on her shoulder "But right now we need to save this man's life, I'm Jack"

Margo nodded whispering her name "Margo", silent tears streaming down her face as she took a hard grip around the metal.

"At three – one, two… THREE!" she lifted as must she could master and watched in horror the last remains of the man's legs being left behind underneath it.

Jack looked at her, after telling the bald man helping them to put pressure on the leg.

"I'm going to throw up you know," Margo whispered, and looked at him scared.

"Yeah,"

"Just wanted to warn you,"

--

Wendy Reyes needed to find her red beret.

It was very important that she found her red beret, it had to be somewhere around. Oh, it was just a terrible mess, but she still needed to find her red beret.

In an eerie calm, Wendy rolled over a body of an old man wearing a Hawaii shirt, seeing if her beret was there, the only thing there was a pair of broken glasses and some blood. She sighed, and continued searching after it. It was an important thing. She had gotten the beret from her mother once, her mother would be mad if she'd lost it, yes she would, be very mad… the beret, she needed to find the beret.

"HELP ME!" Someone grabbed her foot, she fell and hit her face in the glass filled sand.

"HELP ME! PLEASE! I'M DEAD… I'M DEAD…" the woman holding her screamed, clinging onto Wendy, she managed to turn around and face the woman. Her hair was a bloody mess, hanging over her once perhaps beautiful face. Her light skin was deadly pale with stains of blood, a large wound like a flower spreading on her bare stomach…

"HELP ME! HELP ME!"

"LET ME GO!" Wendy screamed, kicking the woman in the face. The woman's hand dropped down on the ground next to her feet and she was free. She pulled herself up, breathing heavily and coughing from the smoke and sand in her mouth. She looked at the now limp woman lying still on the ground, dead still.

"I don't suppose you got my beret?"

The woman didn't answer.

--

"Dom… what are we going to do?" Kate Austen whispered, rubbing her sore wrists as they walked in the tree line of the jungle, out of shot of the chaos, still shaken up after the well, plane crash and the enormous explosion.

"We got to find the Marshall, Kate," Dominic Austen answered his sister, who bit her lip and looked away as she said:

"And do what?"

"You know what we have to do," He responded, looking between the branches on the people running around screaming.

"We split up, I'll take the jungle and you'll go look for him over there –"

"We should look for Kaylee too," she looked slightly afraid.

"Of course," Dominic stopped in his tracks and laid a gentle arm around his sister's shoulders, embracing her in a half hug. After years of running, they were closer than ever, he Kate and Kaylee were like family.

"Let's get going then," she pulled away and started to make her way across the beach to the plane wreckage and without hesitating about going into a dark, unknown jungle Dominic turned around and trekked into the forest.

He just hoped his sister wouldn't hesitate when she found the Marshall.

--

"Mommy!"

"Jeremy!" Florence cried out.

She was sitting in a jungle, lying on a bed of soft big green leaves, small droplets of rain hit her already tear filled face and she, laughing and smiling reached out for her son.

"Mommy!" Jeremy shouted just as happy, running the fastest he could to get to his mother. His too big boots that he had insisted on getting that day, that day she found out slowed him down.

"Wake up, hey, wake up NOW!" Jeremy halted, glaring at her. "WAKE UP NOW!"

"What… no… I…"

She woke up and the cold, ruthless reality hit her when the woman spoke, she didn't listen, refused to hear. She'd just seen him…

"Great, I thought you actually were dead for a while, you look kind of pale, of course you look pale I mean we were just in a plane crash eh, you... who's Jeremy? Oh you don't have to answer; you aren't hurt I think…"

"You talk too much," Florence Bluth responded, trying to hold the image of her son in her mind.

"Not all the time actually, right now... it's just… it's… usually I don't talk much but now…"

"We were in a plane crash,"

"Yeah…" the woman bit her lip.

"Then where are the others?" Florence's voice was full of fear and she swallowed to hold back the tears.

"I don't know…" the woman's black hair tickled Florence when she turned around, looking around at the sweet, but still bitter jungle, over at the black leaves and tangled death traps that was the ground.

"At least we're not alone," Florence whispered and with one single thought she put her son's face away and sat up "I'm Florence,"

"I'm…" The woman's voice trailed off, like she had to think about it and then she smiled and her bright green eyes shone "My name's Kaylee Evans,"

--

Kate couldn't believe the luck in this very un-lucky situation.

She, her brother and Kaylee had after a long time of running gotten caught. Of course they couldn't run forever, they knew that. That sometime, somewhere it had to end.

But that didn't stop her from hating it.

She was walking across the plane crash site, the most people had started to re-locate further down the beach, but some people were still looking after stuff and hoping to find their loved ones alive.

Kate herself was looking after someone she hoped to find dead.

She saw a girl going through some clothes and heard her shout:

"Here's my beret!" before she put a ridiculous red thing on the top of her head.

Kate guessed some people recovered quickly.

She walked past the girl that was now suddenly crying and made her way over to a body lying twisted in the dirty sand. Her heart was pounding hard in her chest, he was dead, he had to be dead.

Kate knelt beside the body, wearing the Marshall's clothes. She slowly turned him around, his eyes were closed and he had a wound on his forehead.

Kate couldn't help but to feel relieved, that meant Kaylee and Dom was safe.

And yeah, she was safe too.

"I'm sorry it had to come to this," She whispered "Why couldn't you just stop-"

The Marshall opened his eyes, grabbed her throat and refused to let go. Kate couldn't breathe.

"Stop," She managed to get out, trying to kick him twisting her way to get out of his grip.

"YOU!" The Marshall spat in her face his grip around her throat getting tighter.

Kate tried desperately to get his hands away but he was too strong, she looked at the side, a broke off piece of debris –

Her hands closed around it.

The Marshall started to cough up blood and his grip around her throat loosened - the piece of metal sticking up off his chest. He passed out and Kate grabbed the metal again, this time she had to make sure he was –

"Is he alive?" A voice behind her interrupted her thoughts; she swung around facing the man.

"I…"

"I saw you tried to get the metal out, I'm a doctor, it should be handled carefully by someone who knows what they're doing – good that you find him anyway, his wound still needs to be cleaned," the man said very fast "can you help me carry him away from here?"

Kate was stunned but grabbed the Marshall's legs as Jack lifted his arms and head.

Dominic was going to get mad.

--

This was his chance, his chance to prove himself. All he had to do was to walk out of these trees and introduce himself as Fox Edwards, a survivor of flight 815. Everything would just go smooth after that.

"C'mon, just don't stand here all day," Ethan barked at him and walked in a straight line towards the survivors that were slowly coming together with Fox running slightly behind.

"You need help with that?" Ethan asked a pretty brown haired girl who beamed at him when he helped her carry the bags.

Fox simply stood there on the sand, trying to calm himself down when he saw how easily Ethan blended in, he started to make his way over to the group thinking about what he was going to say, what to do.

This was his chance.

"Watch where you're going moron!"

He had been so lost in his thoughts he hadn't noticed the girl sitting on the blanket on the sand. He had practically fallen over her.

"We – well… you- you sho – should – watch… watch where you're go- going yourself!"

"Ah yes, because I can see too," She responded and pointed a finger to her eyes.

Fox blinked "So- sorry," Why did he have to stutter and blush, why did he have to act like a teenager all the sudden? He brushed the sand of his clothes and was glad nobody noticed he was new, not one of them.

"Huh," the girl said after a while interrupting the awkward silence between them.

"What?" Fox asked anxious.

"You don't seem that shaken up after the plane crash," the girl didn't seem concerned at all about the fact, almost careless like it was just something that captain obvious would do.

"How do - do you know I… I'm not shaken up?" he felt even more anxious, he knew she couldn't see him even though her face was turned towards him.

"Oh you are shaken up, just not because of that,"

_Silence laid itself between them before the girl blurted out:_

"I'm Lorraine,"

"Oh,"

"And this is the part where you say your name smarty,"

"Fox Edwards,"

"I can't say it's nice to meet you here Edwards," Lorraine turned her pale face away but Fox still watched her.

"Likewise,"

--

"Damn,"

"Damn indeed mate, a plane crash is no joke"

"Just… get lost," Brian muttered and left the British guy slumped on the sand, drive shaft or something. He needed to be alone for simply a second. That was all he needed, the terror of the plane crash haunted him. He saw it every time he closed his eyes – and when they were open. The people being brutally thrown into the air, the blood, the feeling of dropping so fast you couldn't breathe.

And then the impact of hitting the ground.

"Would you like to help me with the fire?" an Arab man asked when he passed by, blocking his way and stared at him challenging.

"Not really," Brian responded and tried to walk around him, but the man took a fire log and put it into his hands.

"I should have specified myself more: help me with the fire or I'll break your arm," the man stated.

Brian chuckled to himself and decided to help this guy out. He took the log and put it on the top of the fire, looking around for more.

"I'm Sayid, what's your name?" The man asked him, as he himself put another log on top of Brian's.

"Brian Haligan,"

They continued to help the fire stay alive in silence. It started to become a big one, hopefully the boats or helicopters or whatever would see it. It wasn't fun work. At least the guy wasn't one for small talk, Brian smiled.

"So, Brian why were you on flight 815?"

Or maybe he was.

--

"Ava…"

"A what?"

"What?" She sat up quickly, hitting her head against the person leaning over her.

"Ouch!" The man winced, stepping away from her.

"Sorry," Bonnie's vision cleared, her eyes flickered over the beach and the sundown - it almost looked like a paradise. Then her eyes met the man in front of her, he was handsome with a confident look on his face.

"Is this a dream?" She gawked, still trying to clear her head.

"Yes it is Blondie," The man smirked "Wanna get it on?" Bonnie opened her mouth to protest but was interrupted by another man coming in fast pace towards them both.

"Sawyer get off her! How are you? Are you okay?" Sawyer blinked at her, and patted the man on the shoulder "Just making conversation Doc," He smiled at Bonnie before he made his way down the beach.

"Hey, my name is Jack, how are you feeling?"

"Uh…"

"You got a nasty wound on your head, it knocked you out for a while, but don't worry, I sewed it up," He leaned forward, looking into her eyes.

"Watch it mister!" Bonnie pushed Jack away from her "What happened, why I am on this beach? Why…" Bonnie's voice trailed off, she saw the fires getting built, people handing out food, plane debris everywhere, how hadn't she noticed it before?

Plane debris?

She swore.

--

"I'll pray for you,"

"I think you need to pray for all of us Rose," Rosalie bit her lip, looking over at the survivors, hoping that she would suddenly see her little girl and her wife darting towards her, happy and unharmed. The sun had almost gone down at the horizon and the rescue boats still hadn't shown up.

"Well, I will pray for you especially dear, for you and your wife and child," Rose looked down at Rosalie's legs and Rosalie understood.

"Thank you," Rose patted her shoulder before easing herself up from the blanket put up on the ground, leaving Rosalie alone with her thoughts.

She fingered on her hair, trying to hold back the tears. Breathing in slowly, breathing out slower, don't panic, she learned that during dealing with her rape. You can be in control if you let yourself be.

"Can I sit here?" the girl that had stomped over to her threw herself down without an answer, sighing annoyed and looking over her back. Rosalie raised an eyebrow.

"You know my brother is so irritating, he's already pretending to be some kind of hero just because he looked after pens or something. I don't know what's wrong with him, the rescue planes will be here any second now and then we're going to be rich and all over the news so what if some people died my name is Shannon by the way," she said very quickly, casting a glance at Rosalie who were on the edge of tears.

"Oh," Shannon let out before Rosalie burst out in a full fountain, crying and sobbing hard. "I... uh, you want to go to the others?" she asked quietly when Rosalie continued to wail.

"I CAN'T WALK!" Rosalie roared and Shannon jumped at her shout and started to look around in panic as a man approached quickly their way.

"What's going on, what did you to do her you –"

"I didn't do anything… just leave me alone!" Shannon fled as soon as she could from Sawyer's murdering gaze. He sat down on his knees and put his arms around Rosalie, holding her tight.

"It's going to be okay Queenie, don't ya worry, we're gonna find Eva and Lalita before you know it!"

"I… I can't feel my legs," Rosalie cried, holding onto Sawyer for dear life.

A few steps away, with his back to them. John Locke sat, running his finger along his jaw before slowly moving his feet.

--

"You're putting the logs on the fire wrong; you want to put in on the bottom of the sides, to make it _bigger_,"

"No I _don't_!" Brian responded irritated, glaring at Owen who apparently now was a fire expert and he put the log on the top. Owen glared just as angry back.

Sayid sighed; he had long given up on trying making peace between those two, it was impossible. The rest of the people were sleeping, or at least as good as they could with Brian and Owen as their fire guards.

"Would you mind keeping it down?" Wendy hissed.

"Yeah, some of us need our beauty sleep!" Sawyer said and looked over at Bonnie, who with one glance at him moved herself further away.

Sinister calm laid itself down again on the survivors, some still in shock and others just focusing on the rescue that was about to come. Sayid had just started to fall asleep when Owen shouted:

"DON'T YOU DARE TO FALL SLEEP DURING DUTY BOY!" and she slapped Brian hard over the head. Brian got up quickly, red in the face when some of the survivors actually chuckled:

"OH YEAH? WELL –"

Sayid snapped: "SHUT UP BOTH OF – "

An enormous growl echoed into the night, a clashing noise. Sayid was up on his feet fast, watching the jungle. The trees were shaking.

"Vincent?" The boy Walt exclaimed, looking around excited.

"That's no dog," Rosalie whispered.

Another, louder growl and suddenly the trees stood still.

"Terrific,"

--

**Author's note:** And so the first chapter is away! This was mostly an introduction to all of the characters, got any suggestions and opinions? Is it way too confusing? Please give them to me – I want all opinions, Thank you all again for your lovely characters, I can't wait to get into more action, I already got so much planned for everyone! As you see, not everyone is at the beach.

And as you also hopefully see, I will change some of your characters, it's necessary for me as a human being and as an evil/good writer!

The chapter's aren't going to be exactly character centric, but sometimes I will focus more on one character with flashbacks and such in some chapters, no flashbacks in this but they will come. I'm so excited!

Please leave a review, they make me happy, and you too – hopefully.

AND I'M STILL ACCEPTING MALE OC'S, EVEN IF YOU'VE ALREADY SEND IN AN OC YOU CAN SEND IN ANOTHER MALE OC! THOSE WILL BE INTRODUCED IN THE SECOND CHAPTER!

That above is a desperate plea.


	4. Down that Town

_A void within the filmy Heaven.  
The waves have now a redder glow —  
The hours are breathing faint and low —  
And when, amid no earthly moans,_

Down, down that town shall settle hence,  
Hell, rising from a thousand thrones,  
Shall do it reverence.

_- The City in the Sea by Edgar Allan Poe _

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 2, Down that Town**

--

Claret was crying. It blurred her vision and made her head ache. It wasn't very helpful when you were alone in a cold, dark jungle after surviving a plane crash. The ground was invisible as her legs drowned in the dark and she was dirty of dried blood and mud. She hadn't slept and she refused to stay at one place even though the night terrified her.

A loud howl pierced through the night and Claret started to sob harder "oh god, oh god… no," she started to run, or as long you can run when you can't see the ground.

Tripping and crying she stumbled onto the long green grass. Finally she'd found something else but trees and trees everywhere.

"Thank God," she cried and buried her face into the grass. She was shaking with every sob. Not even daring to let herself think of what could have possible been out there making that howl.

When the rain started to fall she looked up again, confused and saw the broken form of the cockpit.

"Thank God," she whispered again and stumbling she hurried over to the entrance

"Hello? Is anyone there? Hello?" she screamed over the heavy rain, crawling up into the front. It wasn't quiet, the sounds of the jungle were still everywhere around here. But the sounds that should come from living people were gone.

"Sir, you alright? Hey are you awake? Are you…" her words got stuck in her throat when she saw the deep cut across his belly, dried blood on his clothes. Her heart raced and she opened her mouth to scream:

"Hello there," she twisted around and fell from the cockpit down on the ground screaming in pain. She looked up and met the other man's eyes.

"That must have hurt," he said and titled his head to the side and put forward a hand. Claret took it and he helped her up.

"Thank you, thank you… I thought I was the only survivor, thank you…" Claret was shaking his hand wildly and he looked slightly panicked because of that.

"I'm not a survivor of flight 815," the man stated and tried to regain his hand from Claret's grip. Claret was still shaking it, like she was glued to him.

"What?"

"I'm not a survivor of flight 815, my name is Benjamin Linus and this is my Island,"

--

The rescue planes still hadn't come, some of the survivors were becoming irritated of the delay but still they refused to participate in sorting out clothes and food. The rescue boats would come. They were just late. It was a big world after all.

Some were getting anxious, worried, what if they wouldn't come? What if they had to be stuck on this damn Island for who knows how long? What if the food ran out? What if that growl the other night was some kind of dinosaur?

And then there were those who didn't know what would happen, rescue or no rescue, they couldn't sit around.

Lorraine Hume was one of those people, but Jack 'Wannabe Hero' Sheppard didn't seem to get it.

"I am fully capable on coming with you on this little mission for the cockpit," Lori said in a high voice, she knew that some of the survivors were rolling their eyes and that the most had doubt in their minds, because after all, what use had a blind chick?

"Well, you aren't going," Jack answered, he was tired and she knew that. But he was stubborn.

"Why?" there, she had him in her trap. Nobody wanted to be the mean guy, discriminating a blind girl.

Jack started to stutter and she could hear Bonnie let out a chuckle.

"Then I'm going with you," she had won.

"Excellent," Charlie said cheerful. Kate sighed and Lori knew what she was thinking.

"If you want to come, you have to know where you are going," he meant see.

"Believe me, I'll know," she knew she was looking directly at him, even though she couldn't see him and it made him uncomfortable.

"Fine," Jack said.

"Fine," Lori answered.

"I'm fine also," Charlie put in.

--

The night had gone on without many interruptions, just a few when Owen and Brian switched guard with Sayid and Margo - and Margo realized she wasn't a night person.

Wendy had spent half of the night thinking and the other half dreaming about what she'd been thinking. When the morning came and she still laid on the ground in an apathetic daze; she had been thinking about her brother and the fact that all she had to do to find him, was to ask all of the survivors what their name was – or identify the bodies.

Because one of them was called Hugo Reyes.

And that scared the living hell out of her.

----

Today was Saturday.

That meant for many children at her age, that their mothers or fathers would take them to the store to get candy, to go to the park or just spend the day at the house reading with their daughters or sons.

For Wendy, Saturday's meant that she had to be alone the whole day. She woke up a bit later than school days, went down to kitchen and ate the breakfast her mommy had prepared alone. And read the note that always said the same thing.

_Mommy has gone out for a while, I'll be back tonight_

_Besos._

Then she would go to the living room, pulling out a book in Spanish or English and bury herself in it.

After reading, she'd get hungry and make herself dinner. Forbidding herself to feel sorry, to think that it was anything but normal, because it wasn't.

When she had eaten the dinner, she watched television until her mother, Carmen Reyes got home looking devastated but still trying and failing at smiling to her daughter.

"Sorry I'm late,"

And Wendy would pretend it was okay, that this didn't happen every Saturday - that her mother didn't go to the psychos' house.

It never was okay, not when you were eight.

----

Allen Harwood decided to erase the last pieces of hope he had and went to see if any of the dead bodies belonged to his daughter.

He barely remembered the plane crash, unlike many that remembered it all vivid he had lost the feeling of crashing, he just remembered the one thing. That thing was his daughter.

"Ha- have you…" he swallowed "found a little girl?"

Boone looked up and his face was full with sympathy but Owen, her face not full of anything close to sympathy managed to speak before him:

"We have found many little girls, you need to specify,"

Boone glared at her and Al swallowed again trying to force down the lump in his throat.

"Uh, she… she's blonde and she got these angel, golden curls – just like her mom and this, this amazing smile –"

"Nope, haven't seen her," Owen went back to look through ID's that had fallen out of people's pockets "we do have this body of a girl with brown hair and I guess you're pretty certain about the blonde part so… and it is a BIG jungle, she could be in the forest and –"

"_What_ this emotional handicapped girl is saying is that we haven't found a body fitting your description, sorry," Boone interrupted.

"I'll pray for her," Rose who had just been walking by said with a smile and Owen whispered:

"She still thinks those in the back of the plane are alive, I don't but who knows your daughter might –"

Allen was long gone.

----

"Daddy, look - look clouds!" Ellie was practically jumping up and down her seat, pointing excitedly at the plane's window "clouds!" she shouted again with the innocent smile only a child could have.

"I see them," Allen smiled and turned the page of his paper.

"We are above the _clouds_!" she whispered and laughed, pressing her face against the window again.

After a while Ellie got tired of looking out the window and feel asleep against her father's shoulder. A pregnant girl walking by smiled at them and a stewardess left a candy bar for Ellie to have when she woke up.

Ellie woke up with a stir when the plane started to shake.

"It's only turbulence princess," Allen said when she grabbed his hand and kissed her forehead.

When the plane started to drop, the baggage fell out and front of the plane broke off, Al held his daughter the closest he could. He would never let her go.

But he did.

----

Florence and Kaylee were lost. But Kaylee still refused to admit it.

"How can you not be lost when you've never been here before?" Florence asked and carefully walked over a thick root on the ground. Adapting fast to the situation of being in a mysterious jungle without any signs of civilization (Kaylee didn't count as civilized in Florence's mind).

Kaylee didn't answer and her face was stubborn when she decided that walking left maybe was a better idea. Which it wasn't and soon she and Florence found themselves face down in some icky weird mud.

"Brilliant!" Florence grumbled and glared at Kaylee who was practically covered in green mud.

"Shut up,"

"You shut up!" Florence answered childishly and tried to make her way up from the mud.

Kaylee was tired, irritated, annoyed, upset - all the negative feelings. But most of all she was worried, she was worried to hell about Dominic and Kate, she was worried that she and Florence were the only survivors and she was worried that the rescue wouldn't find them.

She was worried about what would happen if they did.

Her eyes went dark and in a fast motion she took a handful of mud and threw it at Florence.

"No you shut up!" Kay screamed even though Florence had gone silent.

"Very mature," the Australian groaned but didn't throw anything back as she managed to get up on dry land. Panting heavily she laid herself on the ground and tried to get the mud of her face.

SPLAT! Florence yelled when another fistful of mud hit her on her head, dripping down her hair.

"Would you stop?" she cried.

"NEVER!" Kaylee screamed furious and threw another one.

"ARGH!" Florence let out a growl but before she managed to throw mud at Kaylee she fell face down. Kay chuckled and then screamed when Florence pulled her hair.

"Well isn't this hot, please ladies continue on, don't let me disturb you," a cheeky voice said from above. Florence let go of Kay's hair and she looked up and saw Dominic's blinding grin.

With one look at each other she and Florence threw what they had in their hands at him.

--

"Neat,"

"What's neat?"

Brian looked over his shoulder at the beautiful, pregnant girl that had walked up behind him. He tried to keep his eyes away from her belly and said in a cheerful tone:

"I found a surfing board!"

"A surfing board?" the girl repeated and laughed.

"Yeah, it says Kimika on it. I figured that since rescue isn't coming very soon I can at least have fun waiting!"

The girl's smile faded but Brian was just being honest.

"See you later…"

"Claire," her smile was completely gone and she looked down at the sand.

"Brian," he walked away from her, pregnant girls weren't really his thing.

--

Kate hated to worry but that was what she was doing, worrying and worrying. She was anxious and just hoped that Kaylee and Dominic were safe. He hadn't come back to the beach last night and even though he was very capable of taking care of himself – she worried.

"You look worried," Charlie said confirming Kate's thoughts.

"Yeah well," Kate shrugged "Of course I'm worried, with my brother out here somewhere,"

"I still don't understand why he would just trek into this jungle," Jack said in front of them and looked at Kate.

"To see if someone needed help of course," end of discussion.

"Jealous of not being the only hero Jackie?" Lori snickered from behind, still gleeful from proving Jack wrong. She was the only one who hadn't tripped yet and her pale face was the only one without dirt on it.

Jack's answer drowned in the rain that started to fall from the sky.

"Is that normal?" Charlie asked.

"I don't know," Lorraine answered him.

They continued their path in silence until Lori blurted out:

"I recognize your voice by the way Charlie,"

Kate rolled her eyes when she saw the huge smile forming on Charlie's face.

"Ever heard of drive shaft?"

--

"Hey I'm Hurley,"

"Wendy," Wendy smiled brightly at him, he seemed like a cool enough guy.

"Nice beret," Hurley sat down beside her on the sand, looking out at the sea. "Do you want a candy-bar?"

"Thanks," Wendy took a bite, it tasted weird "Is your name really Hurley?"

"Actually it's Hugo Reyes but everyone calls me Hurley… what? Ouch!" Wendy had darted up fast and dropped her candy-bar on Hurley's head. She stared at him.

"Uh…" she managed to get out with Hurley looking at her like she was mental. Wendy quickly looked around.

"BODIES!" Wendy yelled and Hurley jumped "DEAD BODIES! Yes, I need to help them…" she was pointing at Boone and Owen who were over at the plane wreckage trying to identify dead people "BODIES! Yes…. need to go…" she marched away the fastest she could.

"Dude, that chick is crazy" Hurley said and took the candy-bar.

--

"It's Ruby Tuesday by Rolling Stones. Don't you ever listen to music?" Owen asked irritated to Boone who was on the edge of screaming at her. They had been helping sorting out clothes, food and other things that might come in handy. Boone was just about to reply when Sawyer showed up behind them.

"Nice watch," he said and took it from the dead guy they had yet been able to identify.

"Hey!" Boone shouted.

"Thanks for the watch boys," Sawyer smirked at them and walked over to Rosalie who were sitting a bit further away. Boone started muttering for himself.

"Watch it!" Owen cried when she and Boone got covered in sand of Wendy having rushed over to them. Wendy was bright red in her face, looking over her shoulder before saying in a high pitched voice:

"HELP! You need help with that?" C'mon I can help! I'm a helper, real good helper… oh god…" she said very quick and looked like she was about to burst into tears, Owen decided to help her on her way.

"Hey Wendy," she said in a sweet voice.

And then there were waterworks.

----

"Mierda!" Wendy screamed when she dropped the plates, the broken pieces scattered over the floor and when she jumped up and down holding her left foot the porcelain bits cut into her right foot.

"Wendy Aurora!" Carmen Reyes shouted when she walked into the mess, putting her bags of food away on a chair and carefully stepping over to her daughter. Wendy was biting her lip and refused to weep.

"Well, we do not have time to clean this mess up now, your grandmother is expecting us and she will be very mad if we're late, now, go clean yourself up," as usual, her mother was ridiculous calm when she was freaking out.

Finally, after a long fight over Wendy's feet they were in the car. Her mother was driving because Wendy's feet were hurt and Wendy herself was praying that she would get out of the car alive.

The sun was high on the sky when they arrived at Grandma's and a limping Wendy got to endure many complaints about her life as they sat in the living room.

"So, what are you going to do with your life?" her grandmother Aurora that she was named after asked, looking up and down at Wendy as if to judge her.

"I'm going to be a traducer for mute and deaf people," Wendy answered, staring right into Aurora's eyes. She was not giving this fight up.

"That's no work!" her grandmother roared and Carmen cleared her throat.

"Perhaps you could get us some more tea mi amor," she said interrupting the death glare contest and nodded to Wendy.

Wendy limped to the kitchen, growling irritated as easily got the cups from the top shelf. She heard weird noise coming from outside but did not think of it until she heard someone swear. Trying to walk as fast as she could with her feet she opened the door to the back of the house, seeing the freshly new painted garage to her left – it seemed as the noises came from there.

She grabbed a knife from the sink and walked back outside to the garage. She thought of what to scream when she fast rolled up the door.

"HANDS UP!" she yelled and held the knife as a weapon.

BANG!

The man inside had in shock fallen of the chair and was now laying unconscious on the ground, he was wearing a yellow Hawaiian shirt and looked somewhat familiar as if she'd seen him in another life.

"Oh," she let out.

"Are you all right Wendy? Why are you in the – DAVID!" her mother screamed and rushed to the man's side, Wendy quickly recovered:

"Do you know this intruder mom?"

"Intruder? He's the father of my child!" Carmen screamed hysterically before realizing what she'd said "Oh no," she whispered.

"WHAT?"

----

"H- hi,"

Sawyer broke up in his long rant about finders keepers and looked up.

"Well if it isn't Barbie herself,"

"Sawyer give her a break," Rosalie said gently and pressed her lips together before nodding to Shannon who began to speak:

"Well… uh… my brother – they - they've found a body," Shannon stuttered and glanced at Sawyer who didn't say anything.

"It's an African American woman – they want you to identify her,"

All air disappeared from Rosalie's lungs and she closed her fist fighting back the tears.

"We haven't found a little girl though… so if you'd like to come and –"

"She'll come when she's ready," Sawyer snarled and Shannon darted away from them, tears in her eyes. He turned to Rosie, who refused to let any feelings show.

"I can carry you there – or do you want me to identify –"

"It's not her,"

"Of course it's not Queenie,"

--

"Are we there yet?" Charlie asked Jack, and Kate sighed irritated.

"I think Jackie-boy here is lost," Lori said in a taunting voice.

"I'm not lost," Jack answered stubborn.

"Jack, admit you're a little lost," Kate smiled at him and Jack actually managed to make a half-smile.

"I may not see it, but I know when someone's flirting," Lorraine pushed Jack to the side and climbed over the rock he'd been trying to get around for several minutes and she jumped elegant down on the ground.

Jack pressed down his anger and climbed after her and found himself staring at the form of the cockpit.

"Finally," Kate breathed and Charlie landed on the ground behind them when they started to make their way over to it.

"Yeah, don't worry about me," he muttered from the ground before he stood up and fell in line behind them.

"Do you think anybody's alive -"

"Yes," Lori interrupted Kate and rushed to the other side of the cockpit

"SOMEONE'S HERE!" she screamed and they darted after her. There was a woman laying in the wet grass. Her dark hair covered her face but her form on the ground was peaceful; almost like she was just sleeping which Jack after brushing her hair aside realized she did.

"How'd you know she was here?" he turned and faced Lori whose eyes were gazing above his head.

"I just knew," she answered and walked past them and climbed in to the cockpit.

"I'll stay here to wake her up," Jack told Charlie and Kate who both nodded and trailed after Lori. Jack started to shake the woman slightly.

"Hey, wake up," he said with a tender voice, lifting her eyelid.

"NO!" the woman bounced up and pushed him away falling again as she did so.

"Hey, hey calm down!"

"I WON'T CALM DOWN YOU PSYCHO!" the woman cried and looked around, Jack was standing a safe distance from her watched as she started to remember.

"Oh, right, plane crash," she shifted her seat on the ground blushing about her outbreak and shivering of the cold she turned her gaze at Jack "you – you are another survivor?"

"Yes," Jack responded.

"Are you sure?" she asked with a grimace.

"Uh… yeah pretty sure,"

"I've been alone out here forever," she whispered "I… I woke up in the middle in the jungle and then I found – I found this," she waved her hand at the cockpit clenching her teeth together like she was trying to hold back tears – or word.

"I'm Jack," Jack put a hand on her shoulder meeting her eyes "I'm not the only survivor, there are over forty at the beach –"

"Beach?"

"Yeah, that's where the middle part broke off,"

"Has anyone found us?" the woman looked hopeful and Jack hated to crush it.

"No… but we're here to get transceiver, so that we can get help… Kate, Lori and Charlie are inside right now and we should get in, some cover from the rain,"

"There are dead bodies in there," a tear fell of her face, or it could have just been the rain.

"Then we stay here,"

"Thank you," the woman smiled "I… I didn't say my name; it's Claret, Clary Thimbleberry,"

--

"Isn't this cozy?" Montgomery Zidler said and blinked at Margo.

"If being crushed to death underneath this little chair is cozy, then yeah it is Zidler," Margo smiled back and tried to get her feet underneath the seat with the rain falling down hard above them.

"Well, look at this as an adventure!" Zidler exclaimed cheerfully, earning an angry glare from the Koran couple a few feet away, as if being happy was forbidden.

A silence laid itself between them and even though the rain sounded like bullets Margo started to drift off only to be rudely awakened by a loud howl. She yelled and grabbed Zidler's shirt, looking out at the jungle. A clashing noise; just like the night before was heard.

"Isn't that blind chick, Jack, Kate and Charlie out there?" Zidler asked.

"Yeah," Margo answered.

"Just asking,"

--

Bonnie actually prayed that the rain was going to stop soon; Shannon and Boone were driving her mad. Not that she wasn't happy for being recognized, she just hoped it would be someone else than those two. She remembered meeting Shannon when they put up that contest and she was actually glad after that. Thinking she was never going to see her again.

She thought wrong.

"You are Bonnie McQueen!" Shannon shouted for the millionth time and Bonnie took a step away from her as she moved closer.

"I think we've already established little beauty queen's name here before," Sawyer sneaked up behind them, he had actually walked through the rain over to the space underneath the plane's wing.

"Shut it Sawyer!" Shannon shot back.

"Get lost Sticks," Sawyer said and Shannon with one last admiring glance walked over to Rosalie and started to complain.

"I can handle fans," Bonnie said, catching back Sawyer's attention.

"Never said you couldn't,"

Fox was sitting quiet by the entrance underneath the wing. He held his hand under the rain and felt the droplets; he used to do that a lot when he was a child. He tried to count them.

"Hi," someone said and Fox looked up.

"Hey," he answered the pregnant girl, feeling embarrassed as he took his hand in, three hundred and sixteen drops.

"I'm Claire," she said and sat down beside him, holding a hand on her belly.

"I – I'm F- Fox Edwards," he stuttered hoping she wouldn't make a conversation with him. He was worried she would ask questions about the plane, questions he didn't know the answer to.

"You were talking in your sleep last night," Claire said after a moment of silence.

"What?" Fox blurted out and Claire nodded smiling.

"Yeah, it kept me awake, but don't worry I didn't really want to sleep…"

"Was that why that guy Brian poured water in my face while I was sleeping?"

"Yes," Claire laughed and together they watched the rain falling, her hoping for rescue and him for something else.

--

Kate was helping Lorraine, but Lorraine refused to acknowledge it as they barely managed to get up to the door to the pilot's cabinet.

"Where's Charlie?" Kate asked Lori.

"Don't ask me," Lorraine answered, feeling her way to the door and opened it.

She and Kate screamed as a body fell out, shaking with fear they both heaved themselves in, closing the door behind them, entering the broken, dirty room of the front of the plane.

"You – you go look for the transceiver and I'll – I'll check if anyone of them is alive," Lorraine breathed and Kate didn't ask how she could check it without seeing.

Lorraine started to feel her way over the main pilot's face, feeling his mouth –

"OUCH!" she shouted when the man bit her.

"What?" the pilot said.

"You bit me!" Lori had to keep herself from hitting him "You bit me!"

"Are… are you survivors?" the pilot asked and turned his gaze to Kate who was nodding.

"We… we lost communication…"

"We are here to find the transceiver –"

"Water," the pilot's voice was hoarse and he lifted his hand, Lori gave him a water bottle but she was still angry and muttered under her breath.

"The transceiver is in the top shelf," the pilot said.

Kate found it and smiled to Lori who didn't see it but let out a sigh of relief.

"C'mon, let's get out of here, there are many survivors waiting at the beach…"

"Survivors?" the pilot smiled.

"Yeah survivors over forty -"

A loud growl and howl pierced through the windows, the cockpit started to shake and Lori screamed. Then it went silence.

"What… what was that?" she asked and the pilot made his way over to the broken window looking out.

"I… come back –" Lori whispered, having an uneasy feeling.

"I – I see something –It's NO!"

The pilot was dragged out of the gap, dark red bloods scattered over the windows and at Lori's face. The cockpit shook and stumbling, she and Kate fled for their lives.

--

The good thing about rain was that it hid her tears. Wendy had been unable to find any shelter and was sitting on the wet, icky sand drawing in it with her finger.

Suddenly the drops stopped falling on her head; she looked up and saw two grinning people.

"The Korean couple kicked us out," Zidler laughed and he and Margo sat themselves next to Wendy, holding the jacket over them, barely getting any shelter at all.

"Why so sad gorgeous?" Zidler asked Wendy who had gone back to moping.

"I'M NOT SAD!" Wendy yelled and they dropped the jacket on her of shock.

"You usually think cute people are nice," Zidler whined to Margo when Wendy rushed off and the rain drowned down on them.

"Don't go down that town," she answered.

--

"JACK!" Kate screamed when she and Charlie darted out of the cockpit. She couldn't see him and an uneasy feeling told her that whatever it was had gotten him too.

"Where's Lori?" Charlie asked as they stood in shock for a while on the trampled grass.

A roar interrupted whatever answer Kate may have had and they hurried into the jungle.

"JACK!" Kate yelled again as she saw him and Claret running fast before them, Claret stumbling and crying.

"WHERE'S LORRAINE?" Jack screamed over the heavy rain as they ran.

"I – I don't know!" Kate cried but stopped when Jack started to run back.

"JACK!"

"RUN KATE! TAKE CLARET AND RUN!"

"NO!"

"WE DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THIS!" Charlie shouted and helped Claret on her feet, she was shaking hard of fear.

The jungle was getting darker, the rain colored it all a sinister blue and as they ran for their lives everything became a blur. The rain was hitting them in the face and with pounding hearts they only had one thing on their minds.

What would happen if they stopped?

----

"YOU NEVER TOLD ME I HAD A BROTHER?" Wendy screamed at her mother who was for once in her life ashamed.

"You must understand –"  
"NO! I REFUSE TO, I have the right to know I HAVE A BROTHER!" she was blind with rage, red in the face and her brown hair started to fall out of its ponytail.

"Please…"

"Where is he?"

"Qué?" her mother asked confused.

"Don't qué me mom, where's my brother?"

Her mother swallowed, her hand lingering on the table in their living room. A tear ran down her face.

"He's on his way to Australia, in Sydney…"

Wendy picked up her cell phone.

"What are you doing?" her mother asked.

"I'm ordering a ticket to go get to Sydney," she answered, now calm not an emotion showing in her face.

"What? No you can't! Are you thinking you'll see your brother?"

"Hello My name's Wendy Reyes and I would like to book a last minute flight to Sydney, Australia," Wendy said into the phone ignoring Carmen.

"Mi amor, what are you going to do? Find your brother Hugo and everything will just be happy?"

"Yes I can hold on a minute," Wendy continued.

"What will you say to him… if you even find him? Are you just going to say; Hey, my name is Wendy Reyes, I'm your long lost sister…"

"Yes, a flight to Sydney, yeah I'm travelling alone…"

"He won't know you! He will never know you as his sister," Carmen Reyes cried.

"Flight 757 it is," she hung up the phone and turned to her mother "When I meet him, I will tell him everything and then he will hate you too,"

Her mother stared at her, sadness and shock in her eyes as Wendy grabbed her purse from the table and left the room. Her mother put her hands over her face.

"Adiós para siempre" Wendy whispered and closed the door after her.

----

The rain was still falling and it looked like it never would stop. Wendy's gaze trailed the beach line until it landed on Hurley, who was taking cover under a big leaf that didn't do much help. She couldn't help but smile and made her way between the survivors over to him.

"Hey," she said.

"Hey dude," Hurley looked up at her and she sat down and he shared his leaf with her and they both smiled because none of them got any cover from the rain.

"Sorry for freaking out earlier," Wendy said and broke the silence.

"That's alright. We're all a bit freaked after all that's been going on,"

Wendy nodded and they sat there in silence for a while and watched the rain hit the water. Her thoughts trailed away as a small flower of happiness spread in her stomach. She was sitting next to her brother. But he didn't know that she thought and the happiness died. He never knew she existed. They had both been hidden away from each other with reasons unknown and it hurt, that what her mother had said was true, they weren't like real siblings. But still, wouldn't it be so simple to just say; hey, my name is Wendy Reyes; I'm your long lost sister.

"Hurley," Wendy said in a shaky voice and made her decision.

"Yeah?" he said.

"I'm… I'm your… you're a really good guy Hurley,"

--

"It has stopped raining," Charlie confirmed the obvious and suddenly the jungle wasn't as threatening as before and when some grey light managed to get through the branches.

"Hey – hey Kate where are you going?" Charlie shouted after her.

"To find Jack and Lori," she answered over her back and walked fast the direction they had came from.

"I'm… I don't want to go back there," Claret whispered holding onto the much shorter Charlie.

"Uh… yeah…Kate, we'll head back to the camp all right? Is that okay with –"

Kate disappeared when she rounded a tree trying to hold back the tears. With whatever it was that had attacked them, what chances did her brother have in this jungle?

"Hey wait!" Kate swirled around and saw a scared Claret and Charlie stumbling towards her, Kate nodded as a thank you and they continued their way over big roots, stones and the wet ground.

They came to an opening in the forest and Claret walked over to the puddle in the ground. She bent over and took up the shiny pilot ensemble from the ground. Her fingers brushed away the dirt from it and she tilted her head to the side. She tried to make sense of it.

"What –" then she screamed and they all looked up and saw a body; torn to bloody pieces dangling in the branches above them. Small drops of blood fell on the ground and Claret dropped the ensemble.

"Bloody hell," Charlie whispered.

"Bloody hell indeed," Lorraine said courageous as she and Jack came out from the black trees, him supporting her.

"Jack!" Kate breathed happy to see them safe.

"Who in earth could have done that?" Charlie asked.

"Not who - _what_," Lorraine responded "And the answer is quite simple isn't it?"

They waited for her answer and she smiled, her dull unseeing eyes turned directly at the pilot's body.

"Monster,"

--

**Author's Note: **Introducing the new characters; Montgomery Zidler (the charming wizard) submitted by Dance in the Moonlight and Allen Harwood (the wonderful but broken father) submitted by kab16. Thank you for your characters!

Yeah, I said it wasn't going to be exactly character centric, but this chapter definitely focused a lot on Wendy Reyes. I am again going to thank you all for your AMAZING characters that I just can't wait to dig into more!

Male OC submissions are still open until the third chapter, then they're going to close. Even if you've submitted a character or characters you are free to do so again!

Please tell me what you thought of this chapter, I got so happy from your last reviews and I can't wait to hear suggestions and your thoughts.

Namaste.


	5. A Play of Hopes and Fears

_In veils, and drowned in tears,  
Sit in a theatre, to see_  
A play of hopes and fears,  
_While the orchestra breathes fitfully  
The music of the spheres._

_- The Conqueror Worm by Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 3, A Play of Hopes and Fears**

--

The night sky was starry with lights and the absence of light on the Island made it even more beautiful. But none of the survivors had time to admire the beauty. Most of them were sleeping with a lump in their throat, worried and desperately hoping for rescue. The ones awake were too busy not to think about it, the fire guards ignored the dying flames and instead stared out into the jungle. What could it have been? Making that noise?

Fox was widely awake and knew what creature it was. They did not speak of it often, his people; it was an unspoken rule. It existed, it was there but you never mentioned it, never dared to tell of it. It wouldn't hurt him, but still it scared him. It was unnatural, something he could never explain - not to himself, not to anyone. He turned around and took the blanket over his head. He would never fall asleep if he didn't stop thinking.

Wendy was pretending to sleep as she cried without a sound into the sand, tears fell down her face and down on her clothes. Her body shaking slightly with every sob. She wanted to think she was all right, but she wasn't. There still was this broken hole inside of her, the hole that should have been repaired by her brother. But it still was her decision; she wasn't going to do anything different about it. She wasn't going to tell him, no matter how much she wanted to and no matter how much she cried and begged. She forbid herself.

Rosalie was having a nightmare. She whispered uneasy words and her head twisted left and right. She was having a nightmare of harsh hands and a drunken laugh, of a little girl with blood in her hands, of a dead woman hanging in the air. They were all chanting backwards. Dab si nottub eht, Dab si nottub eht, Dab si nottub eht and she begged them to stop. But they wouldn't listen...

Margaret was not dreaming, it was a light sleep with random thoughts flowing into her mind. Cars, which car was best, ugly car, parody of a car, red, yellow orange cars… what if the car chrashed? A tree, black tree, twisted tree, deadly tree, sick tree. Red shoes, black metal, the red shoes were bleeding... a car had driven over them. They were sad.

Allen was trying hard to sleep. But it was impossible as horrid, blaming thoughts crossed his mind every second. It was his fault, his daughter was dead, everyone died, revenge, his fault, why couldn't he die instead? It was at night he remembered everything the most, when he clearly could hear his daughter's words. Her cries when the plane broke off in the middle, when she whispered; _daddy please don't let me go_. It hurt, it hurt to know that the last thing she knew when she died was that he broke that promise.

Zidler and Owen were fire guards, but both of them had drifted off and Zidler snored resting his head on Owen's shoulder. Both were unreachable to the world. Owen dreamt of fame, of rich glasses of wine and a voice so beautiful rivers cried. Zidler dreamt of miracles, his cousin Charlotte's frightened face and again and again about disappearing people. One moment they were there and the next they were gone, always vanishing before he could reach them.

Bonnie was awake, it was only at night she let herself worry. And now she was worrying, anxious about her daughter. She twisted and turned under the blanket, but it was impossible for her to stop thinking about it. The desperate phone call, the doomed flight she managed to take. She wished she had been there with her daughter, anything but here on this mad Island with no rescue. She sat up and looked over the survivors and saw Brian Haligan walking restlessly back and forth at the water line. Apparently it wasn't only her who couldn't slumber.

Brian was doing everything he could to not think about anything. But then he thought of how not to think and somehow it all became one big mess.

Sean O'Donnell didn't trust Zidler and Owen to keep guard and he was sitting on the top of the beach, just right before the jungle to keep an eye on the camp and on the slumbering figures on the sand. He was very calm, as it was easy to fool himself everything was going to be all right at night. When the sounds of the jungle seemed less threatening and when the memory of the strange howls faded. But the memory of the crash was still fresh in his mind, he'd seen many things in his life but when he'd looked back at the tail of the plane breaking off – the people in the air. He shivered at the thought. He had never experienced anything like it, the fear, the screams and the horrid panic.

BANG!

Owen woke with a start and Zidler fell backwards on the ground when the noise came from the fuselage. Weird sounds and growls came from it and the survivors all woke one by one.

"What's that?" Wendy asked and brushed away her tears with her sleeve running up to Sawyer. He had a flashlight in his hand and they hurled to the entrance. Fox was stuttering and Ethan slapped him over the head. Bonnie was whispering loudly and got hushed by Margo. All the survivors looked intently at the fuselage.

A thud was heard followed by a crack and then both Sawyer and Wendy were thrown to the ground when a boar darted over them, fleeing into the jungle leaving stunned survivors behind.

--

Jack sighed of relief when he realized Claret's panic attack was over and they finally could get some sleep.

They were somewhere in the jungle, the heavy trees hid the sky from them and the huge stones surrounding them made him feel at least a little safer from whatever was out there. Lorraine was still a bit mad at him and had her face turned away but Kate sat herself down beside him. Her face showing she had something on her mind and Jack's thoughts went to her brother. He couldn't even begin to understand how afraid she must be feeling, the worry after what they had seen - or well, not seen. What creature could have done something like that? With a bitter smile he thought of Lori's words, monster.

"You should sleep," Kate whispered to not wake up Lorraine, Charlie and most importantly Claret.

"Someone needs to keep watch," Jack smiled but the darkness made it look like a grimace.

"I can keep watch," she said with a serious voice, she still held the transceiver in her hand.

"No I'll stay up, I can't sleep,"

"Jack, I promise you it's okay if you want to sleep, I'll stay up,"

"No really Kate I'm fine, I'll keep watch,"

"I'm serious you need sleep and I'm very capable of keeping watch!"

"But I want to keep –"

"Can you two losers stop arguing?" Lorraine barked at them "Go to sleep and I'll keep watch, and if you even dare to say _but_ I'll wake Claret up!" she threatened.

Kate and Jack looked at each other, Kate surprised but Jack actually smiled to himself and Lorraine was smiling too. It was strange, how the fact that a blind girl could keep watch made them feel safer than they had before.

He had just started to drift off when someone grabbed his hand.

"Jack," Lori whispered and sounded scared "there's some people coming,"

"What?" He flew up and Lori hushed him.

"I can hear them... come,"

They walked between their sleeping friends and Lori led him to where she had heard the sound come from.

"What do you see?" she asked him and Jack knew that it hurt for her to say that. He couldn't see clearly through the dark but he could hear small whispers. There were people out there. Other survivors, was it the people from the camp searching after them?

He let go of Lori's hand and pressed himself through the rocks but immediately Lori grabbed his arm and whispered harshly:

"What are you doing?"

"It's probably our people looking for us," Jack answered her and tried to get out of her grip.

"Yeah, probably, but shouldn't we be sure before we invite them over for tea?"

"Lori there aren't other people on this Island," he managed to release himself.

"Hey! Hey we're here!" he shouted.

"JACK!" Lori roared and woke up the others.

"Just five more minutes," Charlie said tired.

"What's going on?" Kate whispered and walked over to Lori and Jack.

"Ah, we're just chatting you know and oh, Jack decided to invite the local killers to dinner!"

"WHAT?" Claret cried.

"Actually she's right," Dominic said, coming out of the shadows and to them.

"Dom!" Kate exclaimed and embraced him, jumped and hit him on the arm before hugging him once again.

It all happened very quickly and the rest of them stood frozen staring at each other (as much as they could in the dark) until Kaylee's squeal of happiness interrupted the awkward silence. She hugged Kate tightly and then introduced Florence to her. Stillness laid itself between them again until Charlie broke the silence and said:

"Why are you all covered in mud?"

--

"B-O-D-Y-S,"

"It's B-O-D-I-E-S," Walt said uninterested to Hurley as he was drawing in the sand with his finger.

The survivors had gathered to discuss their boar and bodies problem. The smell had started to get almost unbearable and now it seemed as the boars had a disgusting taste for human flesh.

"What about burying them?" Claire said looking at the fuselage.

"I think the boars will the just dig them up," Bonnie responded her gaze following Claire's.

"Ah, I see you got something in your brain," Owen told Bonnie smirking "No, we need to burn them,"

"Burn them?" Hurley grunted.

"We can't burn them!" Wendy cried "What about their rest, what about their beliefs and –"

"We have no choice!" Owen replied and her blue and green eyes stared into Wendy's.

"Peter Pan's right, there's no time to be sentimental," Sawyer put in as he walked by them.

"Nobody asked for your opinion!" Margo shouted after him and he waved, cackling with laughter.

"I think they're right actually," Claire surprised them all by saying "but we could have a ceremony of some sort too,"

"All right, then we'll burn them when the sun's down," Bonnie said.

"You're just getting more and more brain cells!" Owen chirped cheerful and the survivors scattered, all but Walt and Hurley.

"Dude," Hurley said to Walt "why wait until sundown?"

"So that maybe someone will see the fire,"

"Huh, and you are in what grade?"

--

Claire had gotten all the identity information from Boone and Owen and was trying to look through them and set together something to say about each person - but it wasn't easy, how could you judge a person from a plane ticket?

"Elizabeth Smith," she read out loud from the engraved writing on the wallet "a picture of a boat… a credit card, a shrink card…"

"Do- do you want help?" Claire blinked and saw Fox standing above her, she smiled and gestured him to sit down.

"I'm trying to think of what to say of each of them," she told him and he took a passport and read loud:

"Kim- Kimika Ya- Yamazaki, 25, she - she was Japanese," he stuttered but Claire just beamed, happy that at least someone was helping her. They continued to look through tickets, passports, wallets and other things that might help them. They actually had quite a good time and Claire found that she liked the nervous (and very smart) guy.

"Here," they both looked up and saw Sawyer looking uncomfortable above them "Rosalie, she – uh, wanted me to give you this," he held out a book and Claire took it "it's just some… well, uh,"

"Thank you," Claire said and Sawyer walked away, with one look at each other they burst out laughing.

--

"Is it just me," Zidler said "or are they more than when they left?"

"It's just you," Margo joked as they ran to greet Jack and the others.

Lorraine was limping and she had a wound on her forehead, Jack, Kate and Charlie were dirty but it was nothing compared to the three unknown people walking slightly behind them. They were all covered in some weird, green mud and one of the guys laughed and said:

"It's the return of the zombies!"

"What happened?" Margo asked Kate when she came up to her.

"We found some other survivors!" Kate looked uncharacteristically cheerful and Margo took a step back frightened.

"Greetings people from planet earth!" the mud covered guy chirped and shook Zidler's hand.

"I think I like this guy," Zidler told Margo as he went to greet the others and they were introduced to Florence, Claret and Kaylee. A ring started to form around them and Jack cleared his throat only to be interrupted by Lorraine.

"We found the transceiver!"

A cheer was heard from the rest of the people but Owen hushed them ("she has the 'but 'look on her face!")

"But," Lori continued "it isn't working,"

"I can probably fix it," Sean declared and earned admiring glances "I used to handle these kinds of things before in the military,"

"Awesome," Zidler said "who's up for a game of backgammon?"

----

Kaylee was soaking wet.

The rain had fallen nonstop for at least two hours. She was freezing to death on the side of the road and nobody coming by in their cars seemed to be a gentleman enough to actually pick her up, they just made weird hand gestures that apparently was supposed to mean 'sorry'. With a shiver she thought of the creepy old guy with the hammer, no way she was going in the car with him. She hoped he wouldn't report his broken nose to the police – it would just be another of the many black dots on her life.

A black car came through the storm, pretty slow but she wasn't picky right now.

"HEY!" she screamed and ran out in the road. Angry and tired of the world she decided that if nobody would freely give her a ride…

"What the hell are you doing?" the car had stopped in front of her and an irritated woman with freckles all over her face came out.

"The name's Hermione Granger, thanks for picking me up!" Kay yelled at her over the rain and opened the passenger's seat and got in without another word.

"I'm sorry but I can't pick you up!" the woman yelled back and opened the driver's seat and got in.

"We're going the same way anyway," Kay tried to smile innocent but failed, still the woman seemed to budge.

"All right, but at the next town I'm dropping you off,"

"Deal!" Kay's smile was now genuine and as the woman started to drive she turned the radio on.

"Patsy Cline," she said and listened blissfully.

"Aren't you going to ask for my name?" the woman asked keeping her eyes on the road.

"What's your name?"

"If I tell you that I'm going to have to kill you," the woman answered and they chuckled.

"Honestly," the woman continued "It's... Maggie,"

"Nice to meet you and your fake name," Kay said and blinked at her and chuckled at the sight of her surprised face.

"Don't worry, Hermione Granger isn't my real name either,"

"Yeah I figured that out, I have read the Harry Potter books..."

----

Kate, Kaylee and Dominic were sitting by the shadows of the trees a bit away from the other survivors. Kate had just explained the situation to them and they weren't happy. Kaylee was confused and worried while Dom looked ready to murder.

"What are we going to do?" Kaylee asked troubled and casted a glance at Dom.

"There's not much we can do but to stop him once and for all," Dom said dark.

"We can't kill him!" Kate whispered burning her gaze into her brother's.

"What choice do we have?" Dominic asked and leaned forward "we need to put an end to it,"

"You are not a murderer!" Kaylee yelled and then blushed over what she had said.

Kate swallowed, it wasn't true and the look Dominic gave Kay said it all. They were murderers, they had all killed someone. Why didn't matter to the world, they had taken someone's life and that was all that counted. They were going to prison and then to death sentences.

But when Kate looked at Dominic, she knew he was going to do anything he could to prevent that, and that made her relieved.

But not Kaylee.

"How?" Kaylee whispered and gave up the fight, she didn't look at them and Kate knew she weren't going to forget this.

"Sawyer got a gun," Kate bit her lip "I can get that from him,"

"How are you going to do that?" Kay asked.

"I got connections…"

----

"Hell, hell, hell, hell, hell,"

"If you say hell one more time Kay I'm going to send you there!" Dominic screamed at her when they ran through the dirty streets, the sound of a motorcycle closing in on them.

"In here!" Kate shouted and slammed a door open. They darted into the house and Dominic apologized to the old woman in the kitchen before they ran out the back door.

"It's like Die Hard!" he yelled when they crossed the park and crushed the autumn leaves underneath their feet.

Kate rushed to a nearby car with a teenage girl sitting inside of it. She screamed when Kate opened the car door.

"Sorry sweetheart but we're going to have to borrow this," Dominic blinked at the girl and took her out of the car.

"I call shotgun!" Kay panted as they all got into the car, driving away safely as they saw the cops rush by them.

"Now," Kate said after they all had recovered from the chase "let's determine who's fault this was,"

"Kay's!"

"Dom's!" Dom and Kay said in unison.

"How can you say this was my fault?" Dom whined.

"Well if you hadn't started hitting on that hooker –"

"Let's just forget this,"

"And move on to the more important question; was there ever a cop chase scene in Die Hard?"

"Yes!"

"No!" Dominic and Kate shouted and they all laughed, drunk of victory.

"Dom you got the tickets to Australia?" Kate asked after their laugh attack.

"Right here baby," Dom smirked from the back seat and Kaylee let out a sigh of relief before she put on the radio.

_"You can't imagine how much it hurts me..." _the voice on the radio sang and they sang along.

----

"Hey, Bonnie!" Kate shouted and Bonnie looked up from the clothes she was folding – and taking.

"Hey Kate," she smiled and laid the clothes down beside her on the sand.

"Listen, I need some help… I need to get something from Sawyer," Kate swallowed "I was wondering if you could help me,"

"Anytime girl," Bonnie laughed and gestured for Kate to sit down "I think he got a soft spot for me,"

--

"I got the transceiver working but I can't get a signal from here," Sean told Wendy.

"Why?" Wendy asked him.

"We need to get to higher ground,"

"And that's how high?"

"I was thinking the mountains… up there…" Sean said and Wendy turned around, her gaze trailed along the high trees up to the enormous mountains. It looked as if they were taller than the sky above them.

"Oh no,"

--

Jack ran up to Lori who was drinking some water on the beach.

"Where's the fire?" she asked him when he came up to her panting.

"I need some help,"

"With what?" Lori asked.

"The man with the shrapnel inside of him, I need to get it out and I need someone to help me,"

"You need a lot, what use could I be?" she growled at him, still mad because he used to think she couldn't be useful.

"I need someone who doesn't faint at the sight of blood for a start,"

"Hurley?"

"How'd you guess?" they laughed even though it wasn't funny. Lori stood up and together they walked between the plane debris, burned out fires and people towards a serene pause behind some trees. There laid the marshal.

"He's critically wounded," Jack told Lori as he led her to the marshal's side "I need to get the shrapnel out, actually I was going to wait and let the rescue party do that..."

"But as the rescue party doesn't seem to come…"

"Exactly," Jack looked at Lori who weren't looking at him, even if she did she couldn't see his eyes… he swallowed and inspected the wound around the metal.

"Don't trust her… she's dangerous…" the marshal whispered and Lori gasped.

"He's been saying that a lot, trust me… all right. I need you to hold his –"

"Right… pocket…" the marshal interrupted with a whisper and a shocked Jack reached into his jacket pocket.

"What, what is it?" Lori asked.

Jack stared at the mug shot of Kate, barely realizing what he was looking at.

"It's… it's nothing," he whispered.

--

"It's like a play of hopes and fears this Island isn't it?" Margo whispered to Zidler who were busy trying to gather cards from the sand.

"Huh?"

"I mean… it's so strange isn't it?"

"What's really strange is that I'm still missing the king of hearts!"

"I know you're going to find the man of your heart someday," Margo teased him.

"You two lovebirds having fun?" Wendy had walked over to them and took up something from the ground "are you looking for this?"

"YES!" Zidler yelled happy and grabbed the card "now I am complete,"

Margo rolled her eyes at Wendy and they giggled.

"Anyway, that military guy Sean fixed the transceiver and we're going up to the mountains to try to get a signal, do you want to come?"

"Yes!" Zidler shouted again and Wendy frowned.

"Actually I was asking Margo… but if you want to tag along that's fine, will you be ready in five minutes?" Margo nodded and Wendy hurried over to Sean.

Margo glanced at Zidler and saw his devastated face and felt sorry for him.

"Hey don't worry Zid I think she has a crush on you,"

"Really?"

"No,"

--

"Is this everyone?" Sean asked Wendy and looked over at Margo and Zidler.

"Si," Wendy answered him and took the front. The others trailed after her into the jungle. But they had barely gotten through a couple of trees when someone ran up to them.

"Hey wait for me!" Florence shouted and fell in line between Sean and casted a blinding smile at him "I want to come too, didn't I tell you that Winnie?"

Wendy pursed her lips together of being called 'Winnie' and continued walking without a word. Florence made a face and started to make a conversation to Sean who looked uncomfortable with the before mud-covered girl. He tried to excuse himself several times but Flor just kept talking when they trekked across the jungle.

Margo and Zidler put their heads together and Sean knew they had said something about him as they started to giggle like they were in middle school. What had he done to get stuck with such irritating people? They were not exactly the only item he wanted to bring along to a deserted Island.

"Silence!" Sean suddenly shouted and they all froze, listening intently.

"Wha –" Zidler began but went silent as they heard a growl and saw something darting towards them. A mess of white fur jumped and a shot rang out into the jungle. The creature was thrown to the ground as red blood started to pour out from its shot wound.

"I leave you kids alone for one minute," Sawyer came out from the trees, a gun in his hands as he inspected the dead animal.

"Is… is that a polar bear?" Margo asked whispering.

"Yeah…" Zidler answered her and they all stared.

"How... how did it get here?"she asked.

"Or the more important question," Sean said "how did you get a gun?" he asked and turned his gaze to Sawyer.

The survivors turned their heads at him and waited for his answer. Everyone thinking of what Sean just had said.

"I just saved your sorry asses and this is what you think of?" Sawyer waved with the gun "I found this on some guy after the crash, thought it might come handy, and you know what? I just killed a polar bear!"

"I think Sean should have the gun," Florence said, her airy voice calm in the situation and she reached out her hand to get the gun from Sawyer.

"Yeah," Zidler and Margo put in, with an irritated sigh Sawyer gave her the gun and Flor handed it over to Sean.

"You think you can handle that?" Flor asked Sean as they all began to walk again in silence, her voice shivered and somehow she now seemed quite shaken up.

"Yes," Sean answered and soon the whole group was talking away as the sun went lower and lower on the sky.

"So you are in the military right?" Flor asked him and looked hopeful for a response that contained of more than one word.

"Yes,"

"So how was that like?"

"Good,"

"Are you able to say something more than one word?"

"Yes,"

"Touché," she laughed and her black hair fell into her face and she brushed it away as they were faced with the beginning of the big mountain. Sean couldn't help but smile as he saw her shocked expression.

"We're… we're climbing up that?"

"Yes," Sean said and Flor gulped.

--

"Sawyer's gone," Bonnie told Kate who were talking quietly with the girl Kaylee.

"Wonderful!" Kate smiled at her "thank you, what did you say?"

"Just some things about how manly the guys that went on that trek into the jungle were - so he took his gun and went after them, no need to thank me," Bonnie said and laughed but was confused when she saw the fading grins of Kay's and Kate's.

"Uh, right…" Kate whispered and glanced at Kaylee "yeah, thanks,"

Bonnie shrugged and walked away from them. They were pretty ungrateful she thought and started to make her way towards Fox and Claire, at least they smiled when she helped them.

--

"I think that was his only gun," Kaylee complained when she and Kate rummaged through Sawyer's stuff.

"We need it to be quick!" Kate whispered back.

"It doesn't have to be quick," Kay said and swallowed. They could do many things to kill the marshal, choke him, stab him or break his neck. But they had decided that a gun would be quick and somehow more humane. A simple shot into his heart and it would be over. The survivors would be suspicious, but nobody would suspect them right? And he was already so messed up…

Kaylee had killed someone before, she had planned it and still it had all gone to hell. But she didn't feel guilty over it, never had. In her mind what she'd done was just justice – even though the world didn't seem to think so she could at least live with herself.

But this was so much different.

"We can't do this Kate," a tear fell down her face "I can't do this," Kate met her gaze and she knew they felt the same way.

"I know," Kate tried to hold back the tears and she took Kay's hand "I know we can't but Dom can,"

----

The first time Dominic Austen shot someone was actually an accident. His father Sam had taken him hunting and he got to actually hold a gun for his first time. It fit his hands perfectly and with unnatural calmness he had pointed it and pulled the trigger.

He didn't really think that it was actually _loaded_.

When they sat in the waiting room at the hospital his father hadn't looked at him once. His father's friend Jeremy was still in surgery and the police got to hear again and again the story of how Sam Austen accidentally had shot his best friend in the stomach.

When it actually was his son that had fired the gun.

His feet dangled above the floor as she leaned back in his seat, trying to catch his father's eyes. He wanted to hear that it was okay, that it wasn't his fault that it could have happened to anyone.

Don't cry Dom, he whispered to himself as the tears started to well up in his eyes. Big boys don't cry.

"DOM!" Kate shrieked when she ran into the waiting room. She hugged him and whispered "Mommy told me everything," and Dom knew, that she unlike his father would never hold this against him.

So he hugged her back and let himself cry.

----

"He's going to die, isn't he Jack?" Lori asked him as they drank from the water bottles after they moved the marshal to a tent at the outcasts of the camp.

"Yes,"

"Will it be painful?"

"Yes, he will suffer,"

Lori felt her way towards his hand and took it.

"We should do something about it then," she whispered and Jack took back his hand and stood up.

"Do no harm,"

"What?"

"That was the first thing I learned, do no harm, we can't… I can't…"

"Jack I'm not asking _you_ to do anything," Jack turned his face towards Lori's who were blissfully unaware of how upset he was.

"No,"

"He's going to suffer, you said so yourself,"

When Lori stood up and walked away he didn't move. He knew what she was going to do and he wasn't going to stop her. But if she did it, he knew he would never look at her the same way again.

Lorraine walked over to Kate who sat and was re-folding the clothes that Bonnie had folded earlier on.

"Do you have a gun?" Lorraine asked Kate. Kate's head shoot up and she looked slightly panicked.

"What?"

"The marshal that you found, he's going to die, and he's going to suffer a lot, we must make it quick,"

"No, no I don't have a gun,"

"Damn," Lorraine swore "do you know someone who might?"

"No… not really," Kate caught a glance of Dominic and Kaylee a bit away.

"Bye," she hurried away.

--

The fact that they did not need to kill the marshal was a very important fact. But still they all acted like nothing had ever happened, like they hadn't planned to murder the man that had been chasing them. Instead they watched as Lorraine who had gotten quite frustrated fell when she didn't see the burned out fire on the sand and to their surprise Claret, the very panicking woman helped her up.

"Thanks," Lori said embarrassed and hoped that nobody saw.

"You're welcome, you're the blind chick right?"

"Well, I prefer the very intelligent non seeing person but that goes well too… and you are?"

"Claret Thimbleberry,"

"Sorry I haven't learned to recognize your voice yet, long shot but do you have a gun?"

"HOW'D YOU KNOW?" Claret shrieked and let out her arms and pushed Lori to the ground again.

"What? You have a gun?" Lori groaned from the ground.

"Uh… no, I was just kidding I mean, I don't have a gun, not really I just found it I mean, in the jungle running it was scary and BOOM! This big creature and stuff and yeah I got a gun…" Claret said very quickly.

"Can I have it?" Lori asked, not really wondering how the slightly insane woman had gotten a hold of a gun and Claret put the cold weapon in her hand, it seemed as if she carried it around all the time.

"You know, for a freak you're pretty nice,"

--

"Jack…" Lori said with a gentle voice at the entrance of the tent.

Jack turned his gaze away from the marshal and saw the gun in Lori's hand.

"No, you can't do this," he said.

"I know. I'll miss," she admitted to Jack's shock.

"Then who?"

"I'll do it," Kate said and walked into the tent, she casted a glance at the dying marshal and looked away "I won't miss,"

Jack started to stutter but he didn't move, Lori walked carefully over to him and took his arm, leading him away from the tent.

Kate was left alone with the marshal.

"Do it," the marshal whispered and Kate jumped "do it, kill me, it'll just prove me right won't it Katie? You are a murderer, always have been,"

"No," Kate answered and knelt down beside him, the gun in her hands.

"Then why did you stab me?"

"I… I had to… you tried to kill me…"

"Is that what you tell yourself darling? That what you have done is _justified_? What you, your brother and your little friend have done is right, that you all didn't kill someone in cold murder…"

Kate unlocked the gun and put it on his temple; she was shaking with anger and fear.

"Do it!"

--

"I hate you," Margo told Sean when they finally made it to, well not the top but pretty close.

"And you're going to hate me even more, we have to get to even higher ground," Sean was drowned with complaints and irritated moans as they began to once again trek higher and higher. The dark closed in rapidly and soon they could barely see their own feet.

"Please, please Sean look if it works," Flor whined and tried to look angelic in the dark.

"All right," Sean said and the survivors cheered and Zidler started to sing a victory song but was stopped by Sawyer who threatened to murder him in his sleep.

Sean turned the transceiver on and they all went quiet trying to hear something.

"It's not working," Wendy sighed but was interrupted by a hush from Sawyer.

"_Il est dehors. Il est dehors et Brennan a pris les clés. Veuillez nous aider. Ils sont morts. Ils sont tous morts. Aidez-nous. Ils sont morts,"_

"It's in _French_,"

"French! The French are coming!"

"Wait, it says iteration..."

"Hey, wait, anybody speak French?"

"Wendy does!"

"Well... no… I don't actually I…"

"You said you could!"

"Well… not much but…"

"Translate!"

Wendy grabbed the transceiver and held it close to her ear trying to make sense of the words.

"_Veuillez nous aider. Ils sont tous morts. Ils sont morts. Il les a tués. Ils les a tués tous. Rocher Noir..."_

"Uh… help… help me… they are all dead, it killed them… it killed them all… the black rock…"

"_Iteration 17294530 : Si qui que ce soit puisse entendre ceci, ils sont morts. Veuillez nous aider. Je vais essayer d'aller jusqu'au Rocher Noir. Il les a tués. Il les a tués tous."_

"Uh… I'm all alone now… if anyone can hear me… they are all dead, it killed them all…"

"Sixteen years," Sean whispered.

"What?"

"It has been playing on a loop for sixteen years,"

"Does that mean that somebody rescued her?"

"If somebody rescued her then why is it still playing?"

"We are all screwed to hell aren't we?"

--

"Kimika Yamazaki, she was 25 and from Japan. We, we found a surfing board with her name on it… I guess she wanted to go to LA and test out the waves," Claire said and put the passport away from her.

"Eli- Elizabeth Sm- Smith," Fox stuttered "uh, she was in the back of the pl- plane. She was a sh- shrink…"

"Eloise Harwood,"

"Sophie Keller,"

"Manar Mohammed,"

"Tre- Trey George,"

"Eko Tunde,"

Allen barely listened to their words as the flames swallowed the fuselage. The name's faded of all the people who'd died and the fire reflected back in all of their eyes. An eerie sense of bitterness was in all of their hearts and Allan forbid himself from breaking down. He forbid himself to scream and to cry, to throw himself into the flames so he could be with his daughter.

When he walked away from the sinister group nobody stopped him and he sat down on the ground and hid his face in his hands.

One tear, just one tear he could let himself cry.

Something made him look up at the jungle, a shape started to from, a shadow.

Frightened he pulled himself up and wondered if he would call for the other survivors. But as he saw the little girl walk out from the trees, he only stood silent.

And watched his daughter wave at him.

Then a gun shot was fired into the night.

--

**Author's Note: **As I was writing the boars in the fuselage was, I went to lostpedia and to my surprise saw that it was actually the same day that they did get into the fuselage in LOST history. Weird but fun.

This chapter introduced the last OC character (for now), Sean O'Donnell, the military guy submitted by LadyGreySun, thank you for your character!

And all right, I'll eat my hat; the flashbacks are going to probably be character focused. This one was Kay/Dom/Kate and the next is going to be…

I won't tell you, I am evil.

I just want to say this:

I LOVE YOU!

And a few more things:

Thank you all for your reviews, they made me so happy! And you know I want more…

Namaste.


	6. Cloudy Looking Woods

Dim vales—and shadowy floods—  
And cloudy-looking woods,

_Whose forms we can't discover  
For the tears that drip all over!  
Huge moons there wax and wane—  
Again—again—again—_

_- Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 4, Cloudy-looking Woods**

----

"Money," Ellie, Allan's wife said "all we need to settle the deal is money," she smiled innocent and stared at her husband.

Allan himself sat on the far end of the couch he frowned of the idea of giving some guy all their savings.

"Ellie, we can't just give him our money!" he blurted out.

"Oh c'mon Al, he left us all his money – we could have taken them, it's a good deal. Think about it please," she beamed at him and Al couldn't help but smile back. Her smile was his weakness. She knew that and used it against him often.

"You know I don't have time to give him the money myself –" he said and sighed, his wife had won the fight again.

"I'll bring him everything," Ellie told him, she stood up and kissed him before she took the suitcase with the money.

When she closed the front door Allan thought that perhaps this Sawyer was going to make them rich. He started to daydream about a beautiful place in a nice neighborhood where they could move to and raise their children. He took another sip of the wine and grimaced slightly, he was glad his wife wasn't there to see him. She always teased him about not being able to drink anything with alcohol.

----

"We're not getting of this Island are we?" Wendy whispered to the others when they sat around the fire on the mountain, freezing without any blankets to warm them. They had decided to make camp for the night, all of them too shaken up to continue. The transmission's words still rang in their ears, they are all dead.

"Of course we're getting off," Zidler said like he couldn't believe anything else and seemed to be the only one unaffected by the transmission.

"Yes, we need to find the source of the transmission-"

"No," Sawyer interrupted Sean "there's a damn polar bear on this Island and you want to go deeper into it? Sorry but I would like to stay alive,"

"Nobody asked you to help!" Margo snapped at him.

"Well Mary –"

"Margo!"

"Who cares about your name, what's the matter here is that all we can do right now is just to wait for-"

"You know what Sawyer!" Florence interrupted him and stood up, glaring at him "I may not really know you but I kind of got the impression you weren't the sitting around type of guy; and so what if you don't want to find rescue? Since when do _you_ care about what we want to do! Don't even try to pretend you care the least about us!" she grabbed a torch and set off down the hill. Sean hurried after her.

"Hey, Flor don't go all alone!" Wendy shouted after them and rushed towards Flor too. With one look at each other Zidler and Margo followed them, leaving Sawyer behind.

Sawyer sat by the fire and waited for them to come back. But as their voices faded more and more away he realized they weren't. He swore and put the fire out, almost burning his hands as he did so.

"Hey! Hey wait up!" he shouted and then he drowned into the darkness. He had put the fire out and now his only light source was gone. He swore again and tried to find the road down the mountain, fumbling his way over the dirt he reached out with his arms in case he would walk right into a tree.

"Peter Pan? Spacy? Where the hell are you?"

He was pushed abruptly to the ground when he walked into someone.

"Sean is that you?"

When the bag was pulled over his head and the gun pushed into his back, he thought he would have known it wasn't Sean. Sean didn't walk barefoot.

--

"AH!" Kate screamed and dropped the gun on the ground beside the marshal, she was sobbing hard and the marshal was laughing.

"I don't understand you Kate, why won't you shoot me?"

"I'm – not - a – murderer," she whispered between the tears and sat herself up and faced the marshal; blood ran from a rivulet from his mouth and he was smiling. The bastard was actually smiling, he enjoyed the fact that she was broken, always would be.

"Kate," a voice whispered from behind.

"If it isn't Dominic Austen,"

"Kate," Dom whispered again into her ear "I'll do it, you don't have to- I can do it…" he put his hands on the gun. He begged her to let him take it.

"No," Kate whispered and fired straight into the Edward Mars's face.

--

Claire didn't know what happened. One moment they were having a funeral and the next it was pure chaos. She had heard Allan's scream, the shot and Lori's desperate chanting _(She did it, she did it, she did it). _The next thing she was pushed to the ground, her back brutally thrown onto something that made her back bleed and her baby kicked one last time and then it stopped. Her pleads for help on the ground went ignored - she saw Brian meet her eyes and look away again.

"Please," she whispered and forgot for a silly moment why everyone was running around.

"Claire, Claire are you all right?" Charlie knelt beside her and Claire cried a no.

"Don't worry, oh no you're bleeding… here…" He took her arm over his shoulders "I'll help you to Jack,"

"No, no I can't move... I can't…" Claire sobbed when Charlie helped her stand up again.

"You have to," Charlie told her.

As they slowly made their way between the panicking survivors Claire looked over at the jungle, she saw Allan reach out his hand towards something… in her pain she blinked and Allan vanished.

----

"Are you still drinking?"

"Why wouldn't I be drinking?" Allan told his shrink and waved nonchalantly, staring at everything but her.

"We decided that you were going to try to cut down on the alcohol Allan," she said with an airy voice.

"Oh right, yeah I agreed to that until I got home and remembered that I had no money because my wife cheated on me with a conman,"

"Allan, you need to get past it, you can't look back you need to look forward-"

"Isn't that a song?"

"Tell me, have you met Ellie after the divorce?"

Allan fingered on his tie and thought about what his shrink just said then he sighed loudly.

"No,"

"Have you spoken to her?"

"No,"

"Have you made any contact at all?"

"And why would I want to do that!" Allan shouted at her.

"To get her side of the story, you're too angry Al, you're angry at her, angry at yourself. If you could stop being angry you could maybe move on,"

Allen kept silent and she leaned forward.

"Promise me you'll try to talk to her,"

"All right, I will, thank you Libby,"

----

"You killed him," Dom whispered in shock and Kate's answer was interrupted by Lorraine who stumbled into the tent.

"Are you guys here?" she asked, her face turned toward some place above them.

"Yeah," they answered.

"Okay, one thing we didn't count on… gunshots are LOUD!" Lori said frantically "they're going crazy out there! I think Claret even tried to swim away from here!"

Kate looked stunned at Dom who was on his feet fast, he looked out from the tent and shouted:

"It's like mean girls, with guys!"

--

"What the hell is going on?" Jack screamed at the survivors, but his voice was easily drowned by their screams.

"EVERYONE SHUT THE HELL UP!" Lorraine screamed even higher and somehow the running slowed down and Claret didn't shriek just as high.

"Right, everyone calm down…"

"There was a gunshot!" Steve or Scott shouted.

"Yes, yes there was but there's no need to worry we'll-" he cast a look at Lorraine "_I'll_ explain everything,"

"Jack!" he turned his gaze to Charlie that was practically dragging Claire "she's hurt – she needs help,"

Jack turned a pleading look at Lori and she sighed:

"Yeah, yeah go and be the hero, I'll tell them everything…"

--

He'd seen Ellie.

His heartbeat rang through his ears and the blood pumped in his veins when he darted through the jungle. The trees became a blur as he ran and ran and ran.

He'd seen his daughter.

She was alive.

"ELLIE!" he screamed "ELLIE!"

----

"Daddy," Ellie whispered.

"Mhmmm…."

"DADDY!" Ellie yelled loudly and jumped up on his bed.

"Just a minute…"

"Daddy I had a nightmare!" Ellie cried and hid under the covers, tears falling from her face. Allen rubbed his eyes and hugged her close to him.

"What was it about?" he whispered with a tender voice as she sobbed.

"Mommy,"

Al stopped stroking her hair and looked her in the face.

"What?"

"She was mad at me daddy,"

Allan swallowed "Why would she be that?"

"Because I killed her didn't I?"

He thought of her smile, the happy gasp, touching her growing belly, the lights, the car…

"Don't ever think that Ellie, don't you ever think that!"

----

"You're going to be okay Claire, don't worry," Jack said gently and then he nodded to Charlie before he walked over to Lori, who was standing a bit away.

"They don't look happy,"

"How would I know?" she spat and Jack froze surprised at her bitterness. He had gotten used to actually get along with her for a while.

"I'm sorry," Lori said after a minute of silence "but it's not the easiest thing to explain, mercy kill, one of them even threatened to stake me…"

"I understand,"

They both went silent again and Jack cleared his throat awkwardly.

"So I guess you got the gun from Sawyer then?"

"Well, no…" her voice trailed off and he could see in her face that she just realized something "actually I got the gun from Claret,"

"Claret? Screaming panicking Claret?"

"Yeah,"

"How did she get a gun?"

--

After the mass chaos in the night, most of the survivors had gone to sleep in the morning. Fox had stupidly believed he could get some rest when Ethan brutally dragged him into the jungle to 'talk'.

"Ben wanted lists, and you have _nothing?"_ Ethan said in an angry, but hushed tone.

"I- I just do- don't think they… seem- seem like a threat…"

"I guess everyone's right about you; you're not really one of us!"

"Of- of course I am!" Fox said offended.

"Then you'll give me that list by sundown, I'll go in the night and I'll take them to the point,"

"O- Okay," Fox stuttered as Ethan gave him one last angry glare and left towards the camp.

Fox waited until he was out of sight until he took up the crumpled paper from his pocket, with one name on it.

_Claire Littleton._

_--_

"See, I told you everything would be all right," Charlie grinned at Claire who looked down at the ground and bit her lip. Claire took a deep breath.

"But I haven't felt, the baby kick you know," she shrugged and swallowed.

"Well I am sure everything's fine-"

"How can you say that Charlie? I'm eight months pregnant trapped on an island with raging lunatics!"

Charlie coughed "hormones," and Claire couldn't help but draw on her lips.

"See? You're smiling,"

"Yeah… I guess, I just wish I had some peanut butter,"

--

"And then you make the card disappear – like that!"

"Showing step to step on how to do the magic tricks is very interesting and all but do you really want to ruin the magic?" Wendy said and looked over her back at Zidler and Margo.

"I still don't get it," Margo said truthfully to Zidler and ignored Wendy.

"Tontos,"

"So," Florence said and smiled at Sean who were doing his best to ignore her "why did you come after me?"

"Because you had the transceiver,"

"Oh," Flor looked disappointed and then she looked around at the group "Uh, do you know where Sawyer went?"

"Yeah he's right behind…" Zidler turned around but all he could see was trees "Oh,"

"Sawyer can take care of himself," Wendy said and continued on.

"It's not Sawyer I'm being worried about, it's Rosalie, she cannot walk but I do think she might be able to kill us with her brain if we lost Sawyer,"

"Indeed," Margo said and grinned.

--

When the chaos had erupted all Rosalie could do was sit and wait for it to end. Sawyer was gone on some mission and she was tired from yelling at Claire when she had asked what she was going to say about Lalita and Eva.

The hopelessness she used to have was now replaced with determination. She could barely move, but she would find them. She had to find them again.

"Hey Rosie," Shannon said and sat down on the passenger seat from the plane.

"Hey," she answered.

"Kind of crazy wasn't it?"

"Yeah, I saw you fall face down in that pile of-"

"Anyway," Shannon interrupted her quickly "I think Jack and that blind chick's getting way too much power, what do they think, like they're our _leaders _or something? I mean…"

Rosalie enjoyed Shannon's long rants, as they kept her mind off things with Shannon's happy nature and obsessive shoe love. She smiled and listened as she now was complaining about Boone again, she wished she could sometimes be like that. So careless, but most of all she wished her wife an child was with her.

She would find them; whatever it took she would find them.

--

"We're back!" Zidler shouted with joy and was annoyed when nobody came to greet them.

"I'll go tell Jack," Sean said and finally escaped from Flor.

"I'll go talk to people who appreciate my company," she said and made her way towards Kaylee.

They had all agreed to only tell Jack about the transmission, it was best to not scare them all. As Margo said under a moment of seriousness; they all needed hope. And telling them that somebody probably had been on the island for sixteen years wasn't going to make it stronger.

He saw Jack talk to the blind girl.

"Hey Jack-"

"Where's Sawyer?"

He turned around and saw a furious Bonnie standing at his side. He had never noticed how threatening she actually was. Bonnie raised her eyebrows.

"Uh, he's a little behind," he didn't want to cause any trouble.

"A little behind?"

"Yeah," Sean told her and waved at Jack "would love to stay and chat but I have something I must do,"

Bonnie shrugged and walked away. Sean hoped she wouldn't give him difficulty for this.

--

"Do you think Sean's handsome?"

"What?"

"Uh… I said do you think Sean's an idiot?"

"Yeah," Kay answered and took a cut the mango in half and gave Florence a piece.

"So what really happened when you were out there?" she asked and turned her gaze to Flor who were looking away.

"We shot a polar bear,"

"Come again?"

"Hello ladies," Dominic grinned at them and Florence blushed slightly, Kay noticed it and laughed.

"Excuse me Flor but I need to speak to Kay alone," he said and blinked at Flor who blinked back and left.

"What's the matter Dom?"

"I guess you figured we took care of the marshal," the flirty tone was gone and replaced by a serious voice. He sat down beside her and took a piece of her mango.

"Did you do it?" Kay asked him.

"No, it was Kate actually,"

"Oh… I…"

"She's not really in a good place right now, we need to be here for her now…"

"No," Kaylee said and Dominic dropped the mango in the sand.

"Pardon?"

"She killed him,"

"What… she had to, it wasn't her choice-"

"You tell yourself what you want Dom, she killed him," Kay's voice was shivering and she stood up and stumbled away from him.

Dominic took the piece she left behind and took a bite, it was official; women were crazy.

--

The night came too quick Sean thought as he watched the survivors go to rest again. Jack had practically lost all the trust and so had Lori after what happened with the marshal. Sayid had filled him in on, well almost all the details. Exactly who had pulled the trigger was still a mystery.

"Hello Sean," a calm voice said from behind and he swirled around, facing John Locke.

"Oh, hi John,"

Locke nodded and then sat down beside him.

"Where have you been all day?" Sean asked.

"Hunting," Locke looked over at the survivors "I guess it didn't go very well with getting a signal then?"

"No… not really,"

"Well you did your best, are you going to try again?"

"I don't think so,"

"Huh," Locke's eyes grew distant as if he just thought of something and Sean waited for whatever he was going to say.

"So why do you think that is?"

"What is?" Sean asked.

"Why it didn't go well,"

"I… I don't know…"

They sat in silence and then Locke drew out a backgammon game from his backpack.

"You carry around backgammon?" Sean asked surprised.

"Yeah, well, let me tell you something about backgammon," Locke said "it's the oldest game in the world, it's even older that Jesus Christ,"

"How do you play?"

"Two players, two sides, one is dark and one is light,"

--

Allan gave up.

He fell to his knees on the hard ground and wept. With each tear his new found hope spilled out of him. For one lucky moment he actually thought he had found his daughter – _alive_. And then she had disappeared, it had probably been a hallucination. A fragment of his imagination.

After he had laid exhausted on the ground he lifted his eyes up again and came face to face of the entrance of a cave. Surprised he brushed away his tears and went inside the cold tunnel.

Drop, drop, drop.

Small runnels of water ran down from the walls and he saw a waterfall, not a big one pouring down into a stream. A porcelain doll laid underneath the water and he picked it up, Ellie used to have a doll like that. It scared the hell out of him. He smiled at the thought, last Halloween she had awoken him up with that, oh how he had screamed and she had laughed.

He heard a crunch and turned around, he dropped the porcelain doll and it broke into thousands of pieces as he stared into his daughter's eyes. She was sitting on a coffin.

"Ellie…" he whispered, not daring to believe what he was seeing "oh Ellie…"

She didn't say a word but pointed at another cave and he walked into that direction. This one got more holes almost like windows and a little light poured in. Ellie followed him with every step but he couldn't hear her.

He could barely see, but as his eyes got used to the absence of the moon he started to see more. He turned his gaze to the right and saw a skeleton.

He screamed.

----

"I can't find a flight home!" Allan muttered as he went through pages and pages of different flights.

"Does that mean I can stay here and play with Megan? Hurray!" Ellie shouted and put her arms into the air. Allan smiled stressed at his daughter as he dialed another number.

"I want tickets to flight 787," he said to the lady at the other side.

"Daddy I want to go and play with Megan now, come!" Ellie said and tugged his shirt.

"Now now El- no, I was talking with my daughter. So was there any other fli-"

"But Daddy! You promised!" Ellie did her puppy dog eyes look that she knew her daddy couldn't resist, Allan sighed.

"Oh well, is there a flight tomorrow then? I promised my daughter…"

Ellie was now doing a victory dance around his brother's living room.

"Flight 815 it is then," he hung up the phone and then took up the little girl and swung her around. She screamed with laughter.

He couldn't have been happier.

----

"And maybe," Owen sang "You are gonna be the one that saves me!"

"It's you're," Charlie told Owen.

"What?"

"It you're, not you are,"

"Who asked for your opinion, you're just an one hit wonder,"

"HEY!"

"Would you keep it down?" Brian moaned as he tried to sleep.

"NO!" they both shouted.

"Morning can't come soon enough," he grunted.

--

Meanwhile Bonnie was frantic with worry and she was mad at Rosalie for not being as upset as she was. All she would say was that Sawyer could take care of himself all the time. It was not enough for Bonnie, she just wanted to know he at least was safe. Jack was too busy to organize a search party and Lori had laughed in her face when she suggested they would. Nobody seemed to care.

She sighed and decided she would just have to wait until the morning.

--

Allan returned in the morning.

He woke the sleeping figures one by one, Brian almost hit him.

Then he gathered them, said he wanted to tell them something.

"Do you know where Sawyer is?" Bonnie asked hopeful.

"He isn't back yet?" Flor said worried and turned to Sean.

"What is it you want to tell us Allen?" Sayid asked with a calm tone.

"I found some caves,"

"I found a polar bear!" Zidler said and Margo elbowed him.

"I found some caves, there's protection, fresh water – a good place to live,"

"A place to live?"

"Yeah, I think we should move there,"

Some people got upset and started to argue but Michael nodded:

"Yeah that sounds like a good idea,"

"Good idea?" Wendy snapped "what about rescue?"

"It looks like it isn't coming," Brian said.

"But we must be here if it does!" Claire argued.

"I think we should listen to Jack-"

"Who cares what Jack thinks?"

"Listen to me!" Allan shouted and they all went silent again "those who want to move to the caves will go with me by sundown, it's entirely your choice," he walked away and then chaos erupted again – much with the help of Claret.

--

"We need to speak with Claret,"

"We? Jackie boy I must convince everyone not to go to the caves of doom, that freak is all yours," Lori told him and then walked up to Florence; they started to argue immediately and Jack shook his head at them.

"Claret!" he shouted and Claret stumbled over to him. Her eyes still red from the night before.

"What's the matter?" she said in a tired voice, being scared must wear you out.

"I heard you used to have a gun," he said simply and watched her face twist in horror.

"Uh… well…"

"I was wondering how you got it…"

"I… uh, well, you see… uh…"

"It's a simple question Claret,"

"I… uh, I found it! Yes I found it!" she shrieked like she just had thought of that.

"You found it?"

"Yeah… uh, over at the- the cockpit," she stuttered.

"And you didn't think to mention it to us?"

"Well… I didn't know you guys then!"

"And still you gave it to Lori,"

"Who?" Claret asked.

"The blind girl," Jack told her.

"Oh, right her… well, she's blind, she can't do much harm right?"

"Someone got shot!" Jack yelled and she jumped back.

"I… I…" she started to twist her hands and to Jack's horror he realized she was having a panic attack.

"No! No Claret just calm down…" he said softly and quickly looked around for another victim and saw a person walk by "Hurley!" he shouted.

"Oh no," Hurley said.

--

"How did it go with shaky?" Lori asked Jack as they walked side by side.

"I don't trust her, she's lying but I don't know why…"

"But she doesn't really seem like the killer machine type to me, maybe she just found it-"

"No, I'm sure on that part,"

"All right, onto the more important things! How does my hair look?"

"Are you serious?"

"No, Locke wants to leave too and apparently he got a lot of fans, he keeps talking about this destiny thing and even though he's obviously crazy – he says some good stuff Jack. People listen to him, not to us,"

"Then we need to speak with Locke,"

"Maybe we should just let them go, I never liked that guy anyway,"

"No," Jack halted and turned Lori's head so it faced his.

"Uh… you know I can't see you," she said and Jack felt embarrassed but said:

"We know what's out there Lori, we saw it kill the pilot – rip him to pieces, we can't let people wander around out there with that thing there,"

"Correction: we heard, we didn't see," Jack let go of Lorraine.

"I'll go talk to Locke," he said but before he was able to take another step Bonnie showed up in front of him.

"Hold your horses!" she said and looked furious "Sawyer still isn't back!" she glared at him and Jack realized he would be forced to do something about it.

"Well Allan was gone for a long time and he came back okay, I don't think we should worry-" Lori said but got interrupted by Bonnie:

"Don't you think I didn't hear what you said? That's there's something dangerous in that jungle and that's why you won't let people go to the caves? And still you won't give a damn about Sawyer!"

"Calm down, all right, when the sun goes up we'll search after him,"

"When the sun goes up? Jack when the time comes this is going to come back around," Bonnie said with a firm voice. Jack swallowed.

"Sawyer can take care of himself,"

Why did she hear that all the time?

--

"Well hello Jack," Locke said and smiled as the survivors' heads turned to look at him walk up to Locke.

"We need to talk." Jack said.

"About you not wanting to move to the caves?"

"Nobody is moving to the caves,"

"And here I thought everyone had a free choice,"

Locke turned away from Jack and gained the attention of the people surrounding them.

"I guess you've all heard about the caves," he said and some of the people nodded "Jack here –" Locke said and waved a hand at Jack's direction "doesn't want to go, he wants to stay, and why is that Jack? What is your reason for staying?"

Jack casted an angry look at Locke who were just smiling "I want to stay and wait for rescue to come, not go into some dangerous jungle with animals and-"

"The cave walls protect us from the animals," Allan put in with a low voice "and for me it seems much safer than here at the open beach,"

"But what if rescue comes huh?"

"Then they'll see the plane wreckage and find us, we don't need to stay here. No one does, but not everyone needs to come with us either; we'll bring you who stay water and food but Jack, just let those who want to go, go,"

The survivors stared at Jack, most of them agreeing with what Locke had said. He had already won the battle, some would leave and some would stay. It was their choice. He just didn't like the idea of letting people go into the jungle with that… monster he'd seen, heard out there.

"Fine, but look for Sawyer on the way there right?" he growled and didn't wait for Locke's reply as he pushed his way through the survivors. Intent on not arguing more – but still not be happy about it.

"Remember, those who want to leave go here at sundown and I and Allan will lead you there," Locke told the others.

--

As the sun went lower and lower on the sky the rumors grew bigger and bigger. Who were going and who were staying? Arguments erupted between different sides, and soon the more important question was; who did you trust most – Jack or Locke?

Sean liked Locke more than Jack and had already made his decision, it seemed much wiser to leave for the caves where there were food and water than stay at the burning beach. He wondered silently who were going and not and when he looked up from his backpack he saw Florence eating a fruit a bit away from him.

"Hey," he said and waved at her, she smiled faintly and waved back. He took up his bag and walked over to her and sat down beside her on the sand.

"So you're leaving for the caves right?" he asked her and she shook her head.

"No, actually I'm staying," she didn't glance at him and it seemed as if her thoughts were far away.

"Why?" he couldn't understand why she, Florence, would stay.

"I just have to," she swallowed and the before happy (too happy) girl was gone. She suddenly looked much older and serious.

"Again, why?"

"You wouldn't understand!" tears welled up in her eyes and she blinked it away, they went silent until she said: "do… do you got any kids?"

"No," Sean said softly.

"I got a son, he… his name is Jeremy, he…" she swallowed again " I can't give up hope, you who'll leave have already given up hope about rescue but I… I can't give up; I can't settle here, I need to leave this Island, for my son. I must."

Sean didn't say anything, he was surprised. He hadn't seen the beautiful joyful girl as a mother, never this sad and serious.

"I haven't given up-"

"Then why are you going?" she finally faced him and her eyes were glossy with tears, Sean looked away.

"I guess this is a goodbye then,"

"Yeah," she rubbed her eyes and smiled softly.

They went silent and watched in a sinister quiet as many of the survivors started to gather around Allan. He saw Zidler and Margo teasing each other by the front of the group; Shannon sat next to Rosalie and offered her a mango. He saw Dominic trying to talk to Kaylee who walked away from him, he saw Wendy and Owen actually having a conversation and Kate waving goodbye to her brother.

"But it's not like I'll leave forever," he said "I'll come back and give you guys food and water and stuff,"

"Yeah,"

"If I survive with those maniacs," he said as he looked at the group.

"Yeah,"

"Can you say anything but yeah?"

"Yeah,"

--

Jack watched as they left, Locke and Allan at the front. He saw half of the survivors leave, Margo, Dom, Kay, Zidler, Charlie, Claire, Wendy, Boone, Owen, Brian, Ethan, Hurley, Sean and Rosalie. He heard Margo shout "see you on the other side of the cloudy-looking woods!" at him before they walked into the jungle.

The sun blinked at the horizon and disappeared.

--

Dangerous wires were trapped around the wet walls, that and the dropping pipes made a death trap for those who could not handle it. The lights flickered every two seconds and she couldn't help but shudder, even though she had walked through this same corridor at thousand times before.

At the end of the corridor there was a door, its grey metal made strange contrast against the brown yellow walls and with a bit of trouble she opened it and walked into the round, small room.

At the middle a computer stood on a small rickety table.

It was beeping, and a red dot had appeared on the screen with a number beside it, coordinates.

She smiled.

Finally she had found the Island.

--

**Author's Note: **Mystery, how did Claret really get the gun? What really happened to Allan? Who found the Island? What is up with Flor's mood swings? And yeah, what's with the end and Sawyer's abduction?

OC submissions for the freighter folk is going to open up in a while, the freighter guys are going to come soon in this fiction! As you hopefully see, some key things are going to be parallel with the show, but I'm going to create new plots and different obstacles too.

Thank you all for your VERY amazing reviews; they can't make me any happier! But I give you a chance to do that, please review, any suggestions, ideas or reviews make my YEAR. When you guys review all I want to do is write more and more and more. But the next chapter is going to take a while, as I want to update when I see that everyone have kept up and I've know everyone have read.

Math:

Review = update.

Namaste.


	7. Cold Moon

_'Twas noontide of summer,  
And mid-time of night;  
And stars, in their orbits,  
Shone pale, thro' the light_

Of the brighter, cold moon,  
'Mid planets her slaves,  
Herself in the Heavens,  
Her beam on the waves.

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

_--_

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 5, Cold Moon**

**--**

It had gone three days.

Three days since Sawyer disappeared, three days since they left for the caves, three days since Claire had a nightmare and now she woke up from one again. Whimpering and softly crying so that no one would hear, especially so that Charlie wouldn't hear. He was always worrying about her, she hated it. When there were so many other horrid things going on, Sawyer was gone. Sometimes it felt like only Fox could understand her, he didn't worry about her he worried with her. She liked that.

"Why are you up so early?" Owen asked when Claire joined her for some fruit breakfast.

"Why are you?" Claire replied, she was not really in the mood for Owen this early in the morning. She took a bite of some mysterious yellow thing and spit it out immediately.

"Going to join the search party," Owen said when she had finished laughing "Bonnie is quite scary when she's mad,"

"Yeah I know, she wanted me to go when though I can barely take a step with this giant belly,"

"And when the baby comes you're not going to be able to do a lot here either."

"What do you mean here? I'm not going to have my baby here!" Claire spluttered.

"Yeah, right, sure you won't, see you later," Owen stood up, grabbed Claire's water bottle and left.

"I'm not going to have my baby here!" she shouted upset after her disappearing figure.

--

Three days, three days he had been gone, and all Rosalie had done was sitting. She had just sat by the caves and waited for him to come back, for him to come back to her. When Shannon told her that he really was missing she had expected herself to break, like she would just break into tiny little pieces of despair – but she didn't. She didn't even shed a tear. Even though she now had lost the three people she cared most about in the world.

She had actually thought Sawyer was all right when Bonnie had come up to her angry and worried. Sawyer was always all right, he made everything safe; he was never ever in that kind of horrid trouble he wouldn't come back from, he always came back. Getting lost in some stupid jungle wasn't going to stop him.

But now it seemed like it had.

Her legs were cruel, unmovable things, she couldn't feel anymore and somehow that still hurt. However she tried she couldn't make them move. Have faith Rose told her, have fate and it will be all right. Pray to the lord, he has a reason for everything. But what reason could this sorrow have? What reason, what stupid plan was it to destroy her life? She screamed in agony and she saw Margo walk quickly by her. Rosalie swallowed, why couldn't she at least be able to try to save those she loved?

A twitch, small and almost like she had imagined it, but it was there, her toe... had it just moved?

----

There was nothing worse but waking up.

Dreams are easy, unreal; they're a blur of reality and cannot really hurt you. Even when you're running and running from something terrible you know it can't hurt you.

But reality can, reality is cruel, thus waking up is the most horrifying thing in the world.

Drop, drop, drop.

She blinked and her vision became clearer, still it was like looking through water. The world seemed bluer than yellow and even colder than before. She was laying in a bed, monitors beside her. She was in a hospital. The colorless walls and weird smell told her that.

"Hello," she whispered, her mouth was dry and it hurt to speak. Nobody heard her. Nobody was around.

"Help me please…" she whispered but no one came. The rain drowned her every word. She was alone.

Drop, drop, drop.

Just like in the ally.

Harsh hands, unreal words, it hurt, no one came. No… somebody did come… somebody did help her…

Who?

----

"We're taking the west side again,"

"The west side? We've already been at the west side!" Bonnie growled at Locke and Boone, her hair that she had kept surprisingly clean after the crash was now messy, her eyes freaky and her pretty face was not especially pretty when she was mad.

"Well there are only four points on the compass!" Boone said, not really captivated by her when she looked like that.

"We understand that you want to find Sawyer," Locke gulped, the only thing missing from Bonnie's appearance was the smoke pouring out of her ears; she looked absolutely furious. Locke was so glad he wasn't Jack, what had he been thinking not sending out a search party immediately?

"So, we'll go to the west side…" Boone said quietly and backed slowly away from the raging form of Bonnie McQueen. He and Locke rounded the corner of the cave quickly and darted away at west.

--

Even though most of the survivors had been sorted into groups of two, Brian had somehow managed to go searching after Sawyer – alone. He didn't really understand what the fuzz was about; Sawyer had probably just gotten lost and found an epic waterfall or something. Claret was theorizing about alien abduction already and the other day he'd heard Steve (or was it Scott) telling everyone that Sawyer probably had found a boat and left without them.

He didn't like the jungle at all. Its messy ground and heavy plant life wasn't his deal, not to mention that it rained every other second. He stomped between the trees with his hands in his pockets, not really looking where he was going. How great wouldn't it be with some soda right now, or at least some mosquito spray.

THUNK!

Brian fell face right into some rocks.

"OUCH!" he shouted and felt the sharp stone cut into his forehead, his whole body felt like it was pierced by a thousand knives and he got up fast. He glared at the piece of metal that had brought him down. Blood ran down his nose and irritated he dried it off with his sleeve. He grabbed some plants and pulled them off the root and saw that they had been covering a… door, a hatch into the ground.

"Huh," he whispered.

Did that mean somebody had built it? Civilization, there had to be civilization on this Island! But if there was civilization then why hadn't they made contact with them? He stared at the thing for a while and felt dizzy. He needed to get help for his wound and tell the others about his discovery-

"Hello Brian," he stared at Locke and Boone that had appeared out from the trees. They looked at the wound from his forehead and down to the hatch in the ground.

"Well, that's interesting," Locke said.

--

Dominic decided to take a day off the search after Sawyer and went to the beach. He had seen his sister briefly the past days and Kaylee even less, they had both been avoiding him after the whole marshal story. Kate thought he hated her and so did Kaylee, Kate thought he blamed her and Kay thought the same, women, trouble and more trouble. But no matter how mad he was at them for acting so weird, he couldn't help but to feel bad. He wasn't used to be away from them, alone. If Kate wasn't there Kay was there and the other way around. Now both of them seemed to fade more and more away. All that time of running so that the marshal wouldn't split them up, and when they finally got rid of him just that happened.

He came out from the trees and out on the beach, the heat hit him immediately and he was glad he was wearing shoes when he walked on the sand. He saw Lorraine muttering for herself while playing with a knife and he walked over to her.

"Those are dangerous things," he said and Lorraine turned her head at the sound of his voice, her eyes not fixated at anything.

"Excuse me?"

"The knives, you must be sure you can handle them," Dom sent her a charming smile but realized she couldn't see it; he cleared his throat and said in a more serious voice:

"I came here to deliver some water."

"Good for you," Lorraine said without any interest "why are you telling me?"

"Because you are the leader?" Dominic tried.

"I'm not their leader-"

"Hey Lori, how much further up the beach are we going to move?"

"Just out of sight of the airplane, I found a good spot more at the left, with cool sand which means shadows and protection from the heat," she told Sayid and he hurried away, wait, she told Sayid what to do?

"And you say you're not their leader," Dominic shook his head and laughed "when you even got Jarrah doing your bidding, nice," he smirked and ran up to Sayid.

"I'm not their leader!" Lori screamed after him but couldn't get any satisfactory as she didn't see Dominic trip of the shock of her scream.

--

Charlie looked back and forth from Sun and Jin who were talking to each other and to him apparently.

"I still don't understand you," he said slowly, and rubbed his red eyes.

They continued to speak in Korean and he sighed annoyed. It sounded like pure gibberish.

"I do not speak Korean! Okay?"

They went quiet and then Sun whispered something and Jin chuckled, it sounded like they said some words in English.

"Yeah, yeah real funny," he muttered when Sun started to giggle too. He stood up and didn't bother excusing himself as he walked out of the caves. He felt the urge inside of him rise, the need. When he had walked for a couple of minutes he came to a crooked tree, he sat down on his knees by it and dug up his heroin. It was not much left, perhaps only for another week.

He hoped rescue would have come by then.

--

"Hey Claire," Fox said when he came into the caves.

"Hey Fox what are you doing here?" she asked surprised and smiled.

"I ca - came to get water," he held up his water bottles and Claire giggled.

"You know Dom left early this morning to bring you guys water."

Fox looked disappointed down at the empty bottles and sat himself down beside Claire.

"You can help me sort through these clothes," she said "from the practical to the impractical,"

"All right," he said and took up a mini-skirt.

"That goes into the impractical," Claire told him.

"But what if it's a ve - very warm day?"

"Then you can wear it if you want," she said and laughed.

Fox thought of the plan to kidnap her and gave her a fake smile.

--

"Tea,"

"Coffee,"

"Summer,"

"Winter,"

"Purple!"

"Uh… green…"

"Chocolate!"

"Mint…"

"Cats!"

"Dogs..."

"Do we have anything in common?" Florence asked Sean as they trekked across the jungle, looking after Sawyer, not that they thought they would find him, Locke or Jack would.

"Well… we're trapped on an island together," Sean said not coming up with anything else.

"That's… lame," Florence said with a fake serious voice and Sean chuckled. They continued to try to find other things they had in common, but somehow it was like they were opposites.

"What is that?"

"It appears to be in doll… yes it is in fact a doll," Flor declared and they both measured the little doll on the ground "where do you suppose it came from?" she asked with a whisper.

"It probably came from the plane when it broke off-" he reached out a hand to touch it but Flor hit him on the arm, he winced and hit her back.

"What if it's… a trap?" Florence asked and massaged her arm.

"Who would make a trap?"

"Locke and Boone, and aren't you supposed to be an expert at his? As a military guy and all?"

"All right," he said and they continued to walk in silence until Flor giggled and said:

"Don't be sad Sean, I could always get you another toy…"

"Shut up,"

--

Jack told himself again why he had to go with Claret and seek for Sawyer.

He still didn't trust her, not after the false story she had told. She was obviously hiding something and he was going to find out what.

Claret seemed to jump any time something in the jungle made a noise, which was a lot. One time she had almost gotten herself and Jack thrown off a cliff when a spider crawled beside them. But he had to do this; he wasn't going to have anyone around that was a danger. He had told that to Lori, who had immediately started to count up several people that were a danger (Owen, Claire and her hormones, Rosie and her scary look, Margo and Zidler with matchsticks etc). The only real help he had gotten was from Hurley who said he was going to find out everyone's names and see if there were on the manifest.

Not that he thought there were other people on this Island, because he didn't.

"So Claret, was it scary to be all alone before we found you?" he asked her and she glanced a bit surprised at him.

"Of course it was, I thought I was the only survivor, it was terrifying," she said and shivered at the thought.

"But the gun must have made you feel safer right?" he couldn't make his tone sound casual.

"Not really since I didn't know how to use it," she didn't meet his gaze "hey is that a flower?"

"No, it's a bug," he said and Claret shrieked "so where exactly did you find it?"

"Uh… when I woke up in the jungle…"

"You said the cockpit before,"

"That's what I meant, why are you asking me all these questions Jack?"

"Because you're lying and I want the truth," he stopped and turned to her, Claret halted too.

"I'm not lying,"

"Yes – you - are," he said firmly.

Suddenly a scream ran through the forest and mixed with Claret's scream of shock.

"Stay here!" Jack jolted though the trees and towards the sound he heard and left a terrified Claret behind.

Claret shook with fear and leaned her back against a tree and softly sank to her knees. Her hands trailed over the ground and suddenly she felt something cool against her hand. She looked away from the trees and down, she saw a case, almost hidden by the green leaves. She took it up and saw it was half open. Intrigued she almost forgot about the shriek and opened it up.

Five guns fell out, together with a picture of a young boy that resembled someone but she couldn't remember who, then her eyes gazed back at the guns and she realized just what happened.

"What the hell?"

"Oh no," her eyes widened as she met Jack's stare, he had returned and he wasn't happy.

--

Allan had given up trying to find someone to search with; they had all looked at him weird and with fear. Everybody whispered and wondered what had happened to him that time out in the jungle, he didn't say anything.

If any telling them you saw your dead daughter walking around was even going to lower the little trust he had.

But now, as the mystery of the night had gone, the memory of seeing his daughter started to fade. He could almost pretend it didn't happen, what if he really hadn't seen her, it had surely been a hallucination because of dehydration or fear or-

"Drop, drop, drop,"

His daughter stood in front of him, her innocent eyes turned towards his. He blinked and she was gone.

It was definitely dehydration.

--

Bonnie wondered why she cared so much. She barely knew the guy, Sawyer. Still she couldn't seem to get him off her mind as she searched for him every waken minute. She imagined scenarios in her minds, Sawyer falling off a cliff, Sawyer drowning with no one to save him, Sawyer coming back grinning without a scratch on him and her killing him of rage. She smiled, that would totally happen, she hoped it would happen. But if he came back, he wouldn't go to her, he would go to Rosalie. She felt suddenly jealous but put it away, it was cruel to envy a woman who had now lost everything she cared about. If Sawyer… when Sawyer came back of course he would go to Rosie.

"Ethan?" she gasped surprised as she saw Ethan kneeling on the ground before her, he quickly pulled himself up and stared at her.

"What are you doing here?" she asked him.

"I'm looking for Sawyer…" his eyes twitched slightly and Bonnie knew he was lying. But everybody lied on this island about something right?

"Oh, all right,"

They stood silent for a while.

"Uh, right, so I'll go right and you'll go left?" he said.

"Yeah, okay," she answered him awkwardly and watched him walk away. When he disappeared behind the trees she knelt to the ground and dug up whatever he had buried.

It was a piece of paper, she turned it around – it was a _list_.

_Claire Littleton N  
Dominic Austen B?  
Florence Bluth B  
Michael Dawson B  
Claret Thimbleberry A  
Jin Kwon?_

"What the hell," she whispered; she had to show this to the other survivors.

"You shouldn't have looked," she swirled around and saw Ethan's glare, he hit her hard over the head with a rock and all went black.

----

She dreamed again, it was a sweet dream actually. Nothing happened; she just sat in a dark room without any fear and ate mangos, strange, but it was better than dreaming of something else. When she had suddenly woken up from it, she realized she wasn't scared of the dark. But what could be hiding in it.

Then she saw a man's face.

"Hey, hey everything's going to be okay, all right?"

She remembered that voice, when he came and saved her. Then his voice had been ruthless and angry. Now it was just soft.

She sat up and stretched out her arms at him and he leaned forward and took her into a hug. They didn't know each other; she didn't even know his name. But that she was safe with him, that she knew.

And that made it okay.

----

"WHO ARE YOU?" Jack screamed at Claret and grabbed one of the guns off the ground, Claret backed away and tears welled up in her eyes.

"I'm - I'm Claret Thimbleberry," she sobbed and stared at the weapon in his hand.

"Don't lie!" Jack growled and waved with the gun "where you really on flight 815?"

"YES! Yes Jack I was… please but the gun down… please…" she cried and put out her hands as if to protect herself from the gun.

"Why do you have guns?"

"I… I found them Jack… I found them please just…" she sniveled "I found it…"

"You're lying," he cocked the gun and she screamed.

"I… I… please Jack I found it I swear! I found it… please…"

"JACK WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" Jack turned around and saw Sean's fist hit his face and Claret screamed again. He dropped the gun and Sean took it up, Florence ran over to Claret and put her arms around her.

"HAVE YOU GONE MAD?" Sean roared at him and pressed the gun to his head.

"Sean stop it!" Flor yelled and held the panicked Claret close as her face was turned at them. Her eyes filled with shock.

"She… she had a gun…" Jack winced as blood poured from his nose. He hadn't registered what had happened fully just yet.

"Yeah, we heard THAT SHE FOUND IT!"

"He's confused we're all confused and tired let's just go back-" Flor whispered gently to Sean and he backed away from Jack who stood up and tried to stop the blood coming from his nose.

"Now let's just go," Flor said and took Claret´s hand. When she came up to Sean she whispered:

"You can keep pointing that gun at him though,"

--

"Kay please talk to me," Kate begged.

She and Kaylee had been walking through the woods for hours searching after Sawyer and she hadn't said a word to Kate once. It was getting quite tiresome; it was ridiculous really. That they behaved like this, like two children, like her and Dom after a fight. They had never acted like this around each other. Kate couldn't understand it.

"Remember when we first met and you said your name was Jessica Fray?" she whispered.

Kay didn't say anything, she just kept walking.

"Well, do you remember that I didn't drop you off at the next town and we just continued to drive forever? We listened to Patsy Cline and laughed and then, you told me that you had murdered someone,"

Kaylee blinked.

"And without you even telling me why, I accepted that,"

Kay's pace slowed down and she gazed down at the ground.

"Because I knew you weren't a bad person," Kate said with a gentle voice and waited for Kay's response.

"You don't know me," Kaylee whispered and started to run, leaving Kate alone in the endless jungle.

--

"All right, we are officially finished!" Zidler exclaimed happy to Margo and they admired their work with tearful glances.

"You're such a girl," Margo told him with a teary voice and dragged Zidler away to tell the other survivors about their work.

They had in all the sadness and stress been doing something entirely different from searching after Sawyer (they had wanted to help, but they had done more trouble than actual progress) so they had been working on their own little project for a while.

"There are Claire, Hurley and Charlie," Margo said and cheerfully she skipped over to them.

"Hey Hurley," Zidler said "you can't guess what we have done-"

"You accidentally pushed Owen into the river!" Claire shouted.

"Uh… no…"

"You accidentally pushed Wendy down the river!" Hurley guessed.

"HEY!" Wendy said as she came out from the cave to them "why would anyone want to push me down a river?"

"We're just guessing what Margo and Zidler have done," Charlie told her.

"Oh! You accidentally pushed Kate down the river!"

"We didn't push anyone down a river!" Zidler said irritated "we have done something else and much more cool-"

"Anyway dudes I need your names," Hurley interrupted him.

"Why would you need our names?" Claire asked him and Zidler couldn't believe that no one was listening to him and Margo.

"Jack wanted me to," Hurley said and didn't meet their eyes.

"Uh... all right, Charlie Pace, rock star," Charlie told Hurley.

"Your last name is rock star?" Wendy asked him and Margo rolled her eyes.

"And what about you guys?" Hurley turned to Zidler and Margo as Charlie started to play air guitar.

"Oh so _now_you notice us?" Zidler said and stomped off, Margo shrugged.

"His name's Montgomery Zidler, I'm Margaret Tyler."

"I'm Claire Littleton,"

"So what's your name?" Hurley asked Wendy.

"You- you… kno- know my name," she stuttered and her eyes flickered.

"Not your last name," Hurley said and smiled.

"Reyes," she whispered and suddenly her feet seemed very interesting to her as she refused to look at anything else.

"No kidding, that's my last name too!" Hurley said and laughed.

"Yeah whatever bye," Wendy said and took a surprised Margo in the arm and dragged her away.

"So, some of the people aren't really here so could you give me the names of those who are out searching after Sawyer?" Hurley asked them.

"Yeah, there's Jack of course, Kaylee Evans, Kate Austen, Claret Thimbleberry-"

"Olwyn Chauncey, Ethan Rom… and a couple of more you'll have to ask around for them," Charlie said.

"Uh, right, yeah… no way…" Hurley whispered as he looked down at the list.

"What?"

"Uh… nothing, I got to be sure… I'll see you guys later…" Hurley rushed off.

"That was weird," Charlie said to Claire as Hurley also hurried away.

"Yeah so your middle name is Hieronymus?" Claire raised an eyebrow.

"All right that's weirder."

--

"Ethan? Ethan what's the matter-"

Ethan hushed Fox and looked around to see if anyone was there. Fox had been picking fruit in the jungle and Ethan walked right over the mangos on the ground, crushing them.

"We need to take Claire _now_," he growled between his teeth.

"What? No we have to wait for Ben's-"

"That Bonnie girl found me giving Ben the message," Ethan said and smirked.

"What- what di- did you do- do to her?" Fox asked, worry shining through his eyes at the cruel look in Ethan's face.

"She's been taken care of, but now we must lure out Claire and take her, the others on the list can come later."

"We? Wouldn't it be- be better if one of us stayed-" Fox stuttered.

"We don't have to stay anymore – don't say you actually are starting to be fond of these people?"

"No- no," Fox lied.

"Then it would be okay for me to kill, let's say Charlie in the process?"

"Ben would be ma- mad if- if you did that!"

"Ben wouldn't find out."

"We- well I- I wou- would…"

"I'm going to take Claire, and then I'm going to tell Ben about your disloyalty, if you try to even warn the survivors I'll kill one of them," Ethan disappeared behind the trees and Fox stood fallen on the ground.

--

"So what are we going to do?" Brian asked after hours of digging with their rocks and hands. The hatch now looked quite big and he was excited about finding out what was inside it. Sawyer was long forgotten.

"We'll open it," Locke said to them.

"But it doesn't open," Boone complained and grabbed the handle of the door, not managing to open it up.

"Then we'll make it open," Locke said in the same mystical voice.

"How?" Brian asked him.

"Deus ex machina,"

"What?" Boone and Brian asked together.

Locke smiled "we'll build a trebuchet."

"Uh right, but it's starting to get late we should head back-"

"And come back tomorrow," Locke finished Brian's sentence.

"Of course," he said and with one last look at the hatch they walked away from it.

Brian wondered what they would find inside.

--

Dominic helped Sayid carry the water bottles up to the new camp. The few survivors that hadn't moved to the caves and weren't out there searching had all worked the whole day with moving the entire camp.

The plane wreck couldn't be seen from here and it was a bitter taste of sweetness when he saw the survivors acting like they just had moved to a new home.

He gazed up at the jungle and the mountains. The hope and wish for rescue faded with every day. Perhaps this wasn't that bad.

"Idiots, you can't leave the water bottles in the sun!" Lori roared at them.

Minus Lorraine of course.

--

"Hey Rosie," Shannon said and gave her a water bottle "how you holding up?"

Rosalie appreciated the fact that Shannon looked her in the eye, the survivors had before avoided her but it was worse now when Sawyer was gone.

Rosalie gazed around to see if anyone was listening and whispered "I think I could move my leg a little."

Shannon yelled and put a hand before her mouth. Owen who just walked in from the jungle muttered something about psychos.

"You what?" Shannon leaned forward and whispered so that Owen wouldn't hear.

"I think it's a sign," Rosalie whispered.

"A sign?"

"That everything's going to be okay,"

And for the first time in days Rosalie Burton smiled.

----

"Mama Rose I want to go get ice-cream" Eva said to her mother.

"Lita can take you there," Rosalie told her and continued to talk into the phone. They were staying at a hotel in Sydney. The book tour had worn her and her family out. Even the always happy Eva was tired and bored, Lalita was always nagging at her and her manager wanted to do more and more and more.

"Mama Bear says she's busy," Eva said and put out her lip.

"Yes I know but I don't have time that early in the morning!" Rosie said stressed into the phone as Eva continued to whine. Lita came in from the bedroom wearing her training outfit and immediately Eva attacked her.

"I want to go out!"

"I don't have time pumpkin, ask your mother-"

"But she doesn't have time either! Please!"

"Oh I'm sorry but-"

"Please, please, please!"

"Could you two keep it down?" Rosalie shouted and Lita frowned, Rosie hated being angry at her family but she was so stressed…

"Am I coming at a bad time?" At one moment Rosalie thought an angel just had come walking through the door, if you know could mistake Sawyer's appearance for an angel. But she could feel how she calmed down and Eva smiled again and Lita relaxed. With Sawyer there everything was going to be okay.

----

Claire walked into the cave and saw Rosalie and Shannon talk in hushed voices to each other, and she saw Owen standing by the waterfall filling up water bottles. She walked up to her.

"I thought you were out searching?"

"Yeah but I came back to get more water, I'm not one of those sitting around person's," Owen eyed Claire, smirked and put the water bottle in her back pack.

"What do you mean with that?" Claire asked offended.

"Nothing, nothing at all," she zipped up the bag and with a sigh she turned away from Claire and walked towards the exit. Claire followed her the fastest she could.

"I'm pregnant you know," she breathed heavily when they walked into the jungle, Owen several steps before her.

"I never said otherwise," Owen told her and picked up her pace.

"That's why I'm not helping so mu- much," Claire stopped and tried to catch her breath "Ah!" she shouted and held her belly.

Owen halted and turned around and saw Claire panting, not of walking…

"Uh…" she said and wondered what the hell she should do.

"Are you all right?"

"No… no…" Claire whispered and grimaced.

"Are… are you having your baby?"

Claire winced in pain as an answer.

"Oh boy," Owen walked up to her and helped Claire stand up straight.

"We need to get back to the caves all right?" she said and tried not to freak out when Claire breathed faster.

"All right, one step at a time-"

"Hello there," Claire and Owen looked up and saw Ethan stand before them.

Claire didn't have time to scream.

--

"Jack you're back!" Hurley shouted and ran up to meet them. Florence was still supporting Claret and Sean still held his gun at Jack's head. Hurley froze and stared.

"Uh… dudes, what's going on?" he asked as Florence took the crying Claret in the caves and left Sean and Jack to explain.

Jack watched Sean and said:

"It's a long story Hurley… could you put that down now?" he asked Sean that with one last angry glare lowered his hand. Hurley stood silent for a while and then he remembered what he was going to tell him.

"Right, Jack there's something I need to tell you!"

"What is it?" Jack asked and took a step forward and Sean held the gun tighter.

"I was at the beach and in the caves and asked around for all these names, and I got the names of some people, even of those out searching but not all but I stopped when… Jack… Ethan Rom wasn't on the plane…"

--

Jack and Sean left without telling her, Hurley had hurried in and when she had asked him what happened he had just stared blank at her.

"What?" he said and rushed past her and Claret.

Claret was tired after all the panic and had fallen asleep as soon as Jack was out of eye-sight, bur Flor stayed with her and stroke her hair while thinking. She hated to think like this, when there was no one to stop her. When she was around Sean she didn't think about it, not when everyone were stressed at the beach but here with the eternal drop, drop, drop of the caves. She shuddered and wished she could go back to the beach. But Rosalie was busy enough worrying and Shannon was busy trying to make her not worry and someone had to be there when Claret woke up.

Drop, drop, drop.

It reminded her of a song Jeremy had made a rainy Saturday afternoon. He had so tired after nagging to his parents about doing something fun sat down and started to hum with the beat of the rain.

Drop, drop, drop.

Florence buried her face in her hands and hoped nobody would see her tears.

When Zidler and Margo came in she quickly abandoned Claret and went to find somewhere she could stay sleep for the night, it was too late to go back to the beach.

Drop, drop, drop.

Would it please just stop?

--

"It's a cold moon tonight," Margo whispered to no one and watched the moon above them. It was seen through a hole in the cave's roof and she was the only one admiring it. Zidler was already sleeping and with one last glance Margo pulled the blanket over her head.

Scratch, scratch, scratch.

She blinked and took the blanket down, she gazed beside her but all she saw was the cave's wall.

Scratch, scratch, scratch.

She stood up softly and trailed her hand along the cave's wall until she came out to the waterfall. She still heard the scratching noise but couldn't determine its source. Then she turned her eyes to the coffin, the sounds came from there.

She walked quietly over the ground and up to the coffin. The noise grew louder and louder her heart pumped hard in her chest.

Scratch, scratch, scratch.

She slammed the coffin open.

"WE NEED SOME HELP OVER HERE!" Margo woke with a start and looked bewildered around. Zidler was already on his feet and she pulled herself up and followed him.

By the waterfall stood a group of survivors in a ring, except for Rosalie who with the help of Shannon got to the middle, in front of the man kneeling on the ground.

"Sawyer? Are you all right, Sawyer please talk to me?" she whispered gently and stroke his hair, Sawyer's eyes were wide open and he had a cut over his lips. He was shaking and trying to get out words, he whispered something.

"Sawyer… Sawyer what did you say?" Rosalie asked and started to cry.

"We… there are other people on this Island…"

"Claire, Owen and Bonnie are missing!" someone shrieked and the survivors all became silent.

"Does that mean we have to go search again? Because I'm not really in the mood…"

--

Drop, drop, drop, said the river as it slowly drifted by.

"Drop, drop, drop," she repeated and watched it. Suddenly a loud pang was heard and she jumped, she quickly curled up to the only woman she now felt safe with and looked puzzled around.

"Drop, drop, drop," she whispered, "drop, drop, drop they'll come and take us again,"

--

**Author's Note: **Thank you all for your AMAZING reviews. I was grinning like an idiot when I read them, like a very happy idiot! I hope this chapter was good enough and that you all like it - I considered deleting it, but… yeah, it's a necessary "filler" chapter so. The next one is going to be better than this I hope.

And what Sun whispered to Jin was: I hope he doesn't start so sing you all everybody - it's awful.

Math lesson 2:

Reviews + good music + being home sick = chapter (perhaps not a good one)

Namaste.


	8. Pride and Power

But were that hope of pride and power  
Now offer'd with the pain  
Even then I felt—that brightest hour  
I would not live again:

_For on its wing was dark alloy,  
And, as it flutter'd—fell  
An essence—powerful to destroy  
A soul that knew it well._

_- The Happiest Day by Edgar Allan Poe_

_--_

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 6, Pride and Power**

_----_

Brian was scared of many things. He was scared of the dark. He was scared when their mother closed the curtains. He was scared when she turned on the lights. He was scared of the sight of the sun disappearing behind the trees and the sound of the keys in the door. He was scared that when his father would step into the living room he would smell of alcohol.

When he saw his mother close the curtains for the day Brian did was he usually did. He found his new hiding place. Under the bed was no choice, that's where his Dad would look first. His dull eyes glaring into his and with a harsh grip drag him out. He couldn't run outside because his frustrated mother would stop him and behind the closed curtains was no option, his feet would show. This time it was in his mother's closet. He closed the closet door and hid himself behind her shoes and perfume smelling clothes. If he was lucky his father would be too drunk and tired to make an effort searching after him. He tried to breathe as silent as he could. All of a sudden the closet door opened, but if was just his little brother Damien.

"Can I come in?" he whispered and looked frightened. He was holding his miniature dinosaur under his arm; he never let it out of his sight.

"There's only room for one here," Brian answered him coldly and pushed his back against the closet wall.

They keys turned the lock on the door.

"Please," his brother begged and fear shone in his eyes. Brian spread his legs out so there would be no room.

"No," Brian said and closed the door in front of his brother's face. Then he listened as his brother cried with every punch.

_----_

The jungle was dark but small spots were lightened up by the torches in their hands. Small drops of rain fell down but not enough to drown the fire. The jungle was even more terrifying in the dark but Jack continued to run through it, searching after Claire, Owen and Bonnie.

They weren't the only people on this island.

And the other people had taken them.

He'd already sent Wendy to warn those by the beach when he and Sean returned after not finding any trail at all and organized a search party. It was all confusing and he saw in their eyes that they were scared. Whatever had happened to Sawyer he didn't even dare to think about. It was too unimaginable, that there were people out there – watching them.

And now hunting them.

"CLAIRE! OWEN! BONNIE!" he screamed into the night and was accompanied by the shouts from the other people, Margo had a loud scream.

In his right hand he held one of the guns they had found, Sean had protested but the other survivors didn't know what happened between him and Claret in the jungle. They only thought Sean was stressed and not that Jack had held someone at gunpoint earlier.

He needed to concentrate on finding them, not to think of what he'd done. He breathed heavily and picked up his pace.

"Hey I found something!" Zidler shouted from his left.

"What is it?" Margo rushed towards them.

"Uh, it's nothing… sorry," he said embarrassed "I thought I had found a ring or something but it was just dirt."

Jack sighed, they had been walking for hours, they weren't trackers, no matter what Zidler said, and they hadn't found a single trail. He hated to admit it, but Locke was better at this. He had taken another way and Jack hoped he had taken the right one. With every second they were further away from safety, with every second the chances of finding them got smaller and smaller.

--

Rosalie had like usual stayed behind. Not because she wasn't able to help, but because of Sawyer. He had slipped into a worried coma and sweated and whimpered. He got wounds over his head like he had been hit several times and his arm were full of places where needles had been stuck in. he looked terrible.

At first she had cried, but now she was in an eerie calm. She could cry and scream later, now it was important that she was there for Sawyer.

"Hello, is somebody here?" Rosalie stopped bathe his wounds and turned her gaze to Bonnie who stumbled into the cave. Never had Rosalie been happier to see her.

"Bonnie!" she yelled. Bonnie turned her head and saw her and Sawyer. She looked almost as terrible as him, dried blood had run down her messy hair, her face was dirty and she almost looked like a zebra in the face where her tears had made runnels in the dirt.

"Is… is that Sawyer?" she whispered and took a step forward, but just in time Florence came in with more blankets, which she all dropped when she saw Bonnie.

"Oh god, I thought you were a zombie!" she said in a high pitched voice and helped Bonnie to sit down "what happened to you? Are you Claire and Owen all right?"

"Claire and what?" Bonnie asked.

"Owen, you know the mean person that Sawyer calls Marty. Jack and the others are out looking for-"

"No! No… Ethan he, he knocked me out I just woke up and tried to find my way here again… what, what happened to Owen and Claire?" Bonnie looked from Rosalie to Florence with dread.

Rosalie who had stared frozen came alive when Sawyer's eyelids fluttered and she started to bathe his forehead again. Florence began to tell Bonnie everything while giving her a bucket of water to clean herself up. Bonnie listened and yelled swear words from time to time.

And every time Sawyer whispered silent words.

--

The night had been replaced by morning.

Locke, Brian and Boone had more important things on their mind right now. The whole night they had been looking after Claire, Owen and Bonnie – only to come back and see that Bonnie was alive and well. With the promise to keep searching they had gone back to the forest, but not to search, but to open the hatch.

Brian felt bad about it, but Locke said that the morning rain had washed away all the tracks and it now was impossible to find a trail. There really was nothing they could do.

They had started to work on the trebuchet. Boone and him joking around with a serious looking Locke, but as they worked Brian got a more and more uneasy feeling in his stomach, he guessed this was what they called guilt. He hated it.

----

Brian opened the creaking door to his mother's room.

He stood silent as he watched his mother stop kissing the unknown man on the bed. She stared at him with wide eyes and Brian looked down at the ground before he closed the door behind him.

He sat himself down on their small couch and turned on the television. He ignored his mother's pleads and didn't look away from the screen once. The people on the screen were laughing, gorgeous hair and perfect in every single way, he switched the channel. It was the news, bombings, a girl's suicide, highest abduction rate in - he switched it again.

When his father came home he was drunk again and told Brian to get to his room. Brian just looked blank before him as he stepped into the room and his father closed the door behind them. His father raised his hand…

"I found mom with another man today," Brian said in a toneless voice.

Then he hid in the closet again and listened to the horrid cries from his mom.

----

"You didn't even find a trail?" Florence asked Sean in a hushed voice, they sat in the caves and Sean was packing water bottles into his backpack. He took a deep breath.

"No, but we're going again in an hour, we have to find them, but still… it's like they just disappeared into thin air."

"Do you think they are all right?" she whispered hoping for a conversation but he stood up.

"I'll see you later," he said and didn't even look at her before he trailed after Jack and kept a close look on him, always on guard for Jack to go nuts.

Florence bit her lip; she hated it but felt actually a bit hurt when Sean just walked away. But he had to search she guessed, she had never really known Claire and Owen. She couldn't talk to Claire and Owen was, well Owen. She didn't miss them but still wanted to find them, it was strange, but not much and she wondered why that was. Had the island made her a cold ruthless person?

Well, if anything had made her a cold ruthless person it wasn't the island she thought bitterly.

She saw Charlie and knew his pain; everyone had noticed how he cared about Claire. But none of them knew how it really felt to lose someone you loved she thought again bitterly.

"Did they already go? Oh no, no I was supposed to go with them, which direction?" Charlie asked Flor in a frantic voice, his eyes were red and he looked sick.

"Charlie are you all right?" Florence asked when she saw how he twisted his fingers and eyes twitched.

"I was su- supposed to look after Cl- Claire where are they?" He said in a high pitched voice and looked like he was on the edge of tears.

"They left-"

"Oh no, no, no," he whispered and put his hands on his head. Florence felt distressed.

"Charlie, maybe you should just relax…" she told him but he waved her off and set into the direction of the jungle, but the completely wrong way. Florence wondered if she would tell him that or just let him go, but if he was sick it was dangerous for him to be alone…

Flor made a decision and hurried out into the jungle after him. She couldn't see him but when she saw the broken twigs she could easily follow his steps. She pushed some branches a side and saw Charlie sitting by a tree.

He was snorting heroin.

--

"She said I was a murderer, Dom," Kate whispered and glanced at the sun coming up on the sky "she… it's all different now."

"I'll talk to her," Dom said and Kate watched the beach camp that they had moved while she had been looking for Sawyer. Kay had apparently decided to stay there and she was now helping Rose set up a tent.

"I thought she was mad at you too."

"Oh come on sis, who can resist me?" Dom smiled and made a pose which made Kate laugh. He made her feel much better.

"I can," Lorraine said and dumped a box on mango's on him "this needs to be taken to the caves; I guess the people out there looking must eat too."

Wendy who walked by them grinned viciously but she had barely taken another step before Lorraine dumped another box full with fish on her.

"And you missy can take those," Lorraine said and stomped away from them to yell at someone else. Dominic took a bite out of a mango.

"Hey those are for the people searching!" Kate raised an eyebrow.

"Then let's search!"

--

Dom had tricked Kay into coming with them on a day long search after Claire and Owen. The three of them all had backpacks full of water bottles and food to survive the day. They decided to go left and on the beach instead of the jungle, rounding the island. Someone had to do it sometime Dom said.

What he hadn't counted on was Fox Edwards, he'd been sent to tell those at the beach about Bonnie's return and when he heard they were going out on an one to two days search he had uninvited tagged along. No matter how much glares Dom sent him he still didn't get the point.

So now the four searchers walked side by side – without even saying a word. It was getting quite awkward. Kay and Kate couldn't solve their problems with Fox around, and Fox seemed depressed and refused to say anything and Dom, well he had at least tried to bring up a conversation.

"Do you like sports?" Dom asked Fox even though he doubted it. Fox didn't answer but tripped over a rock.

It was going to be a long day.

--

"Hey Mike," Lorraine greeted him when he and Walt came back from the caves with water bottles.

"Hey," he answered and Walt ran off with Vincent. Michael seemed angry and with unnecessary violence he cut a mango in half. Lorraine could feel his wrath.

"Wow, aren't you the cheery one today?" she said.

"How'd' you know?" he asked and sighed, his anger wearing off.

"I just know," she told him and she could hear him chuckle.

"You really are something aren't you?" he took a bite out of the mango.

"I consider myself to be a gift to humanity." Lorraine took one of the pieces without asking.

"You know, almost everyone seems to have forgotten," Michael said.

"What do you mean?"

"That we got to be rescued, that we got to find a way off this island! I mean, look – uh, these people are starting to settle here!" he said upset.

"What are you suggesting?" she took a sip of the water.

"I say we build a raft!"

Lorraine spit out the water "a raft?" she asked and coughed.

"I used to be an architect; I think we could do it."

"You know what - I'm in."

"Great," Michael said simply to an offended Lorraine.

"Great? You know this is a big deal for me to actually help you voluntarily?"

"Should I praise you?"

"I wouldn't ask for less.  
--

"We should try this tomorrow," Locke said and admired their work, the night had started to fall and the sun quickly hid itself behind the large trees.

"Why wait until tomorrow?" Brian asked "I say we try it now!"

"Yeah," Boone agreed and measured the trebuchet they had spent the day building.

"All right, step back…" Locke said.

After their whole construction broke down and still hadn't made even a scratch on the hatch, Brian admitted they should have waited until the morning.

----

Ryan James was a racist.

It was a well known fact around the school; he made fun on the black girls and thought he was above the black guys. It didn't matter if you were brown, Asian or even from any country with a slightly different skin color. He didn't show any respect, when you tried to speak with him he didn't look directly at you and he had been seen cluttering racist and anti-semitism jokes on the back of the gym.

Something had to be done, they all agreed on that. And when something had to be done it was Brian Haligan who did it. They had it all planned, this Friday they would round him after school and show the guy to show some respect. Because people like him deserved it.

Brian had been sent by his mother to go grocery shopping. The only reason he did it was because he needed some extra cash. He stood in line at the super-market and saw Ryan there with a man that looked like his father. They had the same large nose, watery eyes and short built with a top of blonde messy hair.

"We need to switch line son, we don't need our food you be touched by people like him," he said and nodded at the cashier at the end of the line, Ryan looked upset.

"But Dad that line is a lot longer and we have stood here for-"

"Are you talking against me boy?" Ryan swallowed and whispered a no and they switched line to a white cashier. Brian looked away.

That Friday Brian was the first one to throw the punch.

----

Kate, Kay, Dom and Fox made camp just underneath the trees at a rocky beach they had found. All of them had forgotten to take blankets with them so nobody had fallen asleep yet.

Dom wondered if his voice would stop exist if he didn't use it soon.

"Hello?" he said and then shouted happily "still there!"

"What?" Kate asked and tried to make herself comfortable which was impossible. The rocks and twigs pressed into their backs.

"I just wondered if I still had my voice since I don't have anyone to talk to,"

"What?" Kay mumbled.

"All of you are moping! Even Fox!"

"I- I go- got reasons," Fox stuttered.

"We got reasons too!" Kate and Kay said together. Dom smiled as they looked at each other shocked.

"Aw, you're saying things together again isn't that sweet!" Dom said and earned angry glares from Kate and Kay and a confused one from Fox. Dom took his backpack and dragged Fox up on his feet.

"Let's leave the girls alone to kiss and make up," he said.

Suddenly he got hit hard in the back of a mango and when he turned around saw Kay and Kate shrieking with laughter.

"Game on,"

--

"He got a fever now," Rosalie said and pressed down her tears. Bonnie swallowed and fingered on her now much more beautiful and fixed hair.

"How many do you think they are?" Bonnie whispered and her eyes were closed on Sawyer.

"Who?"

"The others, I mean they took Sawyer, they infiltrated our camp and abducted two of our people. They must know we are here… what if they're watching us ri – right now," tears fell down Bonnie's face and she looked so frightened. Rosalie felt a pang of sympathy, she knew how it was to lay awake at night and be afraid that someone would come and hurt you.

"Hey, hey look at me," she said gently to Bonnie and she looked up "breathe slowly. You are surrounded by people that would never hurt you, they cannot take you here but if you let the fear in they might."

"Ho- how do you- you stay so strong?" Bonnie asked and rubbed the place where she had been hit "you have lost every- everyone…"

"I have not lost them, they are always here with me," Rosalie pointed at her heart "and it's something you got to learn to be, to pretend to be…" she gazed down at Sawyer's broken form "but you got to remember that you are not alone."

"I – I got a daughter too," Bonnie whispered and Rosalie's eyes widened in shock. "She, she was in – in an accident before the crash. I was going to LA to be there by her side, but… I don't know if she's okay."

Rosalie didn't know what to say; she never had realized they had something in common, the love only a parent could feel. She didn't say anything but squeezed Bonnie's hand before she went back to try to make Sawyer drink the water.

--

"Hello Claret," Allan said and sat down beside her by the fire.

"Hello Allan," she answered in the same tone.

"You seem mysteriously calm,"

"You seem mysteriously… ridiculous,"

They went silent and watched the flames play before them and rise into the dark night. It was quite serene, the sound of the jungle was more still and the worries of the world felt distant.

"I think the same thing happened to you as it did to me," he said and interrupted the silence.

"What?" Claret asked, a bit of her usual frantic tone back.

"When you were out alone in the jungle, did you see someone?" he asked.

Claret watched Allan's profile. He didn't meet her eyes but looked intently at the fire.

"Yes," she whispered, her heart pounded harder.

"Did that someone tell you to do something?" he asked.

"Yes."

"To me to."

They went silent again, both scared of the other but still desperate to share what they had been through.

"We shouldn't look after them," Claret said "Claire and Owen, we should stop."

"I know."

They went silent again, the fire started to burn out but none of them did anything to keep it alive.

"I wish I hadn't seen someone," she whispered with a teary voice.

"Me too."

--

It was morning again; the sun shone bright on the sky, more white that yellow. The red was clearer than the green, and the trees made a blur as Boone stood in focus.

"Are you ready to work on the hatch?" Brian asked him, his voice was distant. As if someone took his words before they could reach his ears. Boone gazed up at the sky and pointed with one finger. Brian followed his stare and saw a small plane crashed through the sky away to the mountains. A twirl of smoke rose into the air.

DON'T it formed before it vanished into the white sky.

"You shouldn't have given him away," Brian swirled around and saw Locke sit in a wheelchair, one of his eyes was black and the other completely white "everybody pays the price now…"

"Don't," Boone pleaded, he was covered in blood "don't please don't… no I beg… please don't…" He turned his gaze to Brian, one of his eyes were green and the other blue.

"You shouldn't have given him away, he was your responsibility and you gave him away, everybody pays the price now…"

"Don't… please don't…"

"NO!" Brian screamed and woke up, he was in the caves. The morning light fell in from a hole in the cave's wall and he fell back on the blanket as he breathed heavily. He sat himself up again and shook Bonne who laid a bit away from him.

"Wha- what is it?" Boone yawned.

"I know how we are going to open the hatch!"

----

He pretended to sip on the alcohol and watched his friends get drunk. Never once in his life Brian had gotten drunk, he had made that promise a long time ago. They were laughing too loud, smiling too much and glaring even more. Celebrating the graduation by preparing themselves to throw up the next morning.

Brian lifted the glass to his mouth but when one of his friends accidentally pushed him he dropped it over a man who walked by.

"What the hell are you doing?" he roared at Brian. His friends raised their eyebrows at him and they wanted to see a fight. But the southerner seemed as if he had already been in a fight (he had band-aid over his nose) and could probably take him down.

"Sorry, I can get you a drink as compensation."

"What about some money?" the man tried.

"No."

"All right," he said and Brian ordered a new drink.

"What happened to you?" he asked the man and pointed at his the nose.

"I could ask the same thing," the man measured the black eye on Brian's face.

"Life," Brian answered.

"Yeah it always gets to you huh?"

When the man left all Brian remembered was a man that looked like he had been in a bar-fight when he described the guy who took his wallet.

----

"Hey wake up!"

Jack blinked and saw Sean's face.

"We're going to have a trial, let's go!" he said and threw some clothes to Jack.

"A what?"

"You threatened one of us with a gun, now we got to make sure you're not one of them or evil or something!" Florence told him from the other side of his tent and smiled mischievously.

"Hurry up!" Sean said and glanced out at the beach. Sean dragged Jack up and they walked out of the tent. Jack didn't try to fight Sean off, he needed to do redemption for what he did, but that didn't mean admitting he was wrong.

They took him away from the survivors, none of them noticed the gun in Sean's hands and into a couple of trees, there was a circle without any growth and there Sean released Jack.

"All right, we got a couple of questions to ask you and the first is-"

"What's that?" Jack interrupted him and pointed at the candles on the ground.

Florence sighed "we asked Zidler and Margo to help but they completely misunderstood us-"

"Is that why there's a-"

"We're here to talk about you now!" Sean said red in the face.

"What the hell were you doing?" Florence shrieked at Jack, and he wondered if they were actually serious about the 'trial', and it seemed as they were. He decided to play along.

"Claret had a gun with her here to this beach; I had to find out how she got it!"

"But she isn't the murder, gun fighting type of person," Florence put in.

"Yes, I know that."

"Then why where you pointing that gun to her head?"

"I was confused, stressed, dehydrated," Jack shook his head "I did a really bad thing but I stand by one thing, and that is that we got to find out how she got the gun."

"She found it."

"She lied."

"But why does it matter?"

"It matters because there are other people on this island, and they infiltrated us – kidnapped us. We must be careful."

Florence and Sean looked at each other.

"I don't get you Jack," Sean said after a moment of silence "I don't get why you must be the hero, fix everything and why you then go off and threaten poor Claret, I don't understand, we are going to tell the others about what you did and you need to apologize to Claret!"

"Okay," Jack answered and wondered if Lorraine would ever talk to him again after she'd heard what he'd done.

"Good, and after you have apologized you will stay away from her."

--

"I - I saw it get down somewhere that way!" Brian said and pointed towards the mountains.

"And this will help us open up the hatch?" Boone asked with doubt in his eyes.

"Yes!"

"I don't know if it will Brian," Locke said "maybe it was just a dream."

"Were you in a wheelchair?" Brian said with a calm voice.

"Excuse me?" Locke asked.

"Before the plane crash, were you in a wheelchair?"

Locke looked him into the eyes and after a while he said:

"Let's go find this plane."

----

"Are you feeling better?"

"No, worse but they say that's how it works," Damien answered him and chuckled. They sat in the visitor's room at a rehab in Sydney. The walls were in a light green color and the whole room looked like it was inspired by vomit. Brian frowned.

"This place okay enough?" Brian asked awkwardly, he didn't really know what to say.

"Yeah I guess… honestly I hate it, they got good therapist though," his brother nodded "which reminds me, he said I got too much anger and I need to get it out."

"Uh… that's great…"

"Why did you never protect me?" Damien said and took him by surprise "all that time Dad beat us why didn't you protect me?"

"I don't know what you're talking about-"

"You would always try to find ways to make him hit me more than you! It was always I who stayed home from school with bruises all over my body and failed all the classes, while you went off with your newest girlfriend and played _sports_. It was I who got kicked out of the house for taking Dad's car when it was actually _you. _It was I who had to steal to just get a little heroin and then overdose… why Brian? Why?"

Brian kept silent and met his brother's eyes. His eyes were full of tears and Brian's were unnatural cold.

"Can't you feel guilt?"

----

Sawyer muttered something bur Rosalie didn't react, he had been mumbling words in his sleep and he was feverish. Jack had given him antibiotics the night before and even though Sawyer still was out he seemed at least a little better. Jack said he would recover in a few days and there was nothing to worry about.

His eyelids fluttered and this time he opened his eyes. Rosalie left her hand in mid air and her eyes widened.

"Sawyer," she whispered "Sawyer…" she turned his face to her way and he saw her.

"Rosie…" he whispered and Rosalie grabbed a bottle of water at her side and put it to his mouth and he drank.

"There are other-"

"I know, you told us," Rosalie whispered and stroke his hair back, Sawyer's head leaned to the side and he didn't talk more. Still Rosalie felt hopeful; he had at least woken up.

"Has he said anything yet?" Bonnie had entered the cave and looked at the sleeping Sawyer.

"Yeah, he just woke up and drank a little water; he's going to be okay."

Bonnie smiled.

--

Michael realized Lorraine wasn't much help when it came to building a raft, even Walt did more good. Lorraine couldn't follow his orders all the time because of her blindness and in the end all they did was fight. So when Jin walked by with Sun to get water he had managed to make him help him.

But he still hadn't got rid of Lorraine.

Right now she was arguing with Walt about comics.

"Those painters sucks," she told him and failed to bind two logs together.

"Lori," Michael said and lost patience "could you just leave?"

"What?"

"I don't need your help anymore."

Was she actually sad? He didn't figure Lori could feel sadness.

"But I still get to be on the raft right?"

"Of course," anything to get her out of there. She dropped the logs on the ground and walked away, her shoulders hunched and almost as if she was disappointed. Jin spoke Korean.

"Yeah, yeah I know," Michael answered him.

--

"We should wait with telling them," Margo said to Zidler as they trekked across the jungle and searched after Claire and Owen.

"Wait telling them what?" Zidler asked.

"You know the project."

"Why?" Zidler whined.

"Because everyone's _so_ depressed and some of us have gotten abducted!"

"I suppose," Zidler said broody. Things hadn't gone exactly like planned, Margo patted his shoulder.

"So let's talk about Wendy-" she said with a smile and Zidler tripped.

He found himself face down in the ground with Margo laughing. He quickly got up to yell something when he saw what he just had tripped over.

"Margo, did Claire own a diary?"

--

Sawyer awoke once again and this time he was ready to talk, as soon as somebody would get those damn leaders.

Wendy had hurried away to find Jack who were at the beach and Lorraine too. Jack had immediately told Sawyer to shut up and lay down as he examined his wounds. When Sawyer was declared to be well again Sawyer muttered some swear words under his breath and said:

"Now that Doc here is done there's something I would like to tell you."

"What?" Bonnie asked.

"Well maybe what the hell happened to me," he said with a dark voice "Rosie has told me what happened while I was gone and it seems as I can maybe help to clear this little situation up."

The survivors eagerly awaited his continuation.

"When I got taken, they put a bag over my head. It was two people, a woman and a man. Both were barefoot but I couldn't see their faces. They didn't knock me out but took me for a long walk in the jungle. And then they pushed me down some -it was a door in the ground. I was definitely taken underground. They put me inside this room, still with a bag over my head and they tied me up to a chair. That's when they started to take my blood."

"Vampires?" Lori asked not believing what she was hearing.

"No, not vampires Pixie, they took it with _needles_. Kept me there for I don't know how long… but let me tell you something, they couldn't have been more than four different people. "

"How'd you know?" Jack asked.

"Because at the end I took off my bag, knocked those four people out, grabbed the notes and got the hell out of there."

"But how did you get in such a bad shape?" Rosalie asked him.

"Try wandering around in the jungle for a couple of days with no food or water and see how you'll look when you come out,"

"So you're saying…"

"That I know where they took Claire and Marty? Yes."

"Everyone!" Zidler and Margo had rushed into the caves and Margo held a diary above her head, waving with it.

"We found a trail!" Zidler shouted happily.

"We know where they have been taken!" Bonnie shouted back.

"You people got too much pride and power," Margo muttered.

--

"You are not leaving again!" Rosalie glared at Sawyer; he had actually forgotten how scary her eyes could be when she was mad.

"I have to; I am the only one who knows where Barbie and Ken are!"

"I just got you back!" Rosalie growled and pain flashed across her eyes and Sawyer's mouth went open. He had known Rosie for so long, and she knew the battle was lost. He still felt guilt for leaving her again. But he got to do this one right thing.

"I know Queenie, but I got to do this," he told her and took her hand.

"I wish I could come with you," Rosalie whispered and looked at Bonnie who was ready to go.

"Well you aren't the only one disappointed," Sawyer said and they glanced at Jack who had just been yelled at by Lori for even considering going.

"Take care," Rosie said and hugged him.

"You know me."

"Yes, and that worries me," Rosalie laughed but started to hiccup as a tear fell down her face.

"Rosie," Sawyer whispered.

"Yeah?" she said and pulled away. Sawyer took up some papers from his jeans pockets and put them in her hand.

"I found these when I was captured, maybe someone can decipher them or understand them," he said and Rosalie glanced at them.

"4 8 15 16 23 42?" she asked and then waved goodbye as he, Bonnie, Sayid and Wendy left.

--

"Claret!" Jack said and ran up to her by the waterfall; Claret shrieked and dropped all the clothes down in the water.

"No, don't be scared… I wanted to apologize,"

Claret looked like she was having an inner battle of between staying or running.

"I, I did a horrible thing to you," he took a deep breath "and I understand if you'll never trust me. But you have to believe I'm sorry, I was out of control – what I did… I'm sorry."

"Do you still want to know how I got the gun?" she asked and her voice trembled.

"Yes, but I won't be asking you more times – I'll leave you alone," he said and Claret nodded. "Florence, Sean and I are going to tell the survivors what I did-"

"No!" Claret exclaimed and looked more anxious.

"What?"

"Don't tell the others… I'll go talk you Sean and Flor, you have apologized…" it looked as she didn't want to say those words but forced herself too, he saw tears well up in her eyes "they can't lose trust in you, not yet."

--

"There it is! I told you it was here!" Brian yelled and ran over to gaze more directly at the plane stuck in the vines above them.

"Wow," Boone uttered. Even Locke seemed impressed. They all stood and admired it for a while.

"So," Boone said after a while "what now?"

"Now one of us needs to climb up and see what's inside," Locke looked directly at Brian.

"Yeah I'll do it," he didn't mind, he was excited. His dream, it meant something, it was special. He grabbed one the vines and started to heave himself up. Locke and Boone watched him as he climbed all the way up to the plane and crawled inside.

"What do you see?" Locke shouted from the ground and Brian looked around. There were two corpses and he shuddered, then he saw a Mary Virgin statue at his feet.

"What did you find?" Boone yelled.

Brian saw small bags of heroin scattered and broken twigs. But nothing to open the hatch – but maybe something to get them rescued.

He stumbled over to the front where the radio communication should be held. He pushed some buttons to see if he could get a signal. Static came through and he yelled of joy.

"What?" Locke screamed again and Brian answered:

"I found a radio!"

"A radio, but what about the hatch?" Boone shouted.

Brian pushed some buttons and screamed into the radio.

"Hello, hello is anybody out there? This is Brian, Brian Haligan a survivor from flight 815, Mayday, Mayday! We're the survivors of flight 815!"

"_But we are the survivors of flight 815,"_ a girl's voice shouted back. Brian stared shocked at the radio.

"Come again?"

"_We are the survivor's of flight-"_

CRACK!

The plane got loosened from the vines and crashed down at the ground below. Smoke started to rise once again and inside was a broken radio and a small puddle of blood started to form on its floor.

--

**Author's Note: **I got well. Then I went to school and lost my voice. I was supposed to do a representation. I couldn't talk.

But when you can't talk you write!

I want to say thank you for all of your reviews and suggestions are VERY welcomed. Thank you again for your characters! And I hope you're ready to send me more…

The Kahana guys are coming early in this fiction.

It's time for…

Freighter applications!

Since you've all given me such wonderful characters I want you to give me some more. Everyone can submit. Unfortunately I'm not going to accept many, just an even amount of boys and girls. Make some crazy characters (and I still want the insane, homicidal cute character *hint*).

**Name:**

**Nicknames:**

**Age:**

**Appearance:**

**Personality:**

**Flaws:**

**Fears:**

**Friends:**

**Enemies:**

**Catchphrases:**

**Love interest and belief in love:**

**Occupation on the freighter (security, chef, science etc):**

**Past (include reason for being recruited): **

**Do your character believe in Destiny?:**

**What is your character's favorite book?:**

**If your character had a gun in their hands, what would they probably be doing?:**

**Anything else:**


	9. Smile No More

_And travellers, now, within that valley,  
Through the red-litten windows see  
Vast forms, that move fantastically  
To a discordant melody,_

While, like a ghastly rapid river,  
Through the pale door  
A hideous throng rush out forever  
And laugh- but smile no more.

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 7, Smile No More**

--

"JACK!" Locke shouted when he and Boone carried Brian into the caves. Jack stared baffled at them for a second before he helped them lay Brian down on a blanket. Brian was a bloody mess, one of his legs looked crushed to pieces and the other one was twisted in a weird angle. The blood and life was pumping out of him with every second. The survivors stared, terror shining through their eyes at the sight of Brian.

"Margo!" Jack roared and she jumped with a hand over her mouth.

"Yes?" she answered and looked terrified.

"Get me some bandages, Zidler get me some water and Shannon go get Lorraine-"

"But-"

"Do it!" Jack screamed at them and he started to desperately try to patch Brian up. "Locke I need you to tell me exactly what happened…" he looked around at the cave, Locke was nowhere to be seen.

--

"Hey Sean," Florence said and walked up to him by the raft. He was helping Jin and Michael build it and seemed very concentrated on what he was doing.

"Uh, hey," he replied while he tried to figure out how he was going to fix the main sail. An awkward silence laid itself between them and Florence nodded slowly.

"So," she said "is it going well?"

At the same moment the cut off tree they were going to use broke in the middle and Michael swore. Sean felt like he didn't need to answer the question.

"Do you want something?" he asked Florence when Michael and Jin started to argue.

"I… I was…" she looked at his cold stare "never mind," she muttered.

"HEY!" someone shouted. They all turned to Shannon who was running towards them. She looked frenetic and gasped for air.

"Have- have you seen Lorraine?" she said and held her stomach.

"What happened?" Flor asked.

"Bri… Brian he, he was in an accident, I need to get Lorraine now!" Flor and Sean looked at each other.

"Yeah, yeah I'll go get her!" Michael shouted and ran off towards the camp.

"Does he need more help?" Sean asked.

"Yeah, probably-" Sean darted off into the jungle and Florence followed him.

Shannon was left with Jin and Sun. Jin said something in Korean to Sun and she shook her head. Shannon just stared at them.

"Accident," she said "I don't suppose one of you used to be a doctor or healer?" Sun's eyes flickered and then she took Jin's arm and said something before she looked at Shannon. Jin stood like fallen from the skies.

"I can maybe help," she said to a very much shocked Shannon.

----

Florence gasped in surprise as he held the flowers in front of her. It was the normal red ones, roses, but she couldn't have been happier when she threw her arms around him. Wasn't it every girl's dream, to get carried away at the sunset with your knight in shining armor? Of course pregnancy wasn't a part of that scenario but she was still happy. It was all a walk on roses, just as those she had in her hands. The world had a glossy shine and she was madly, stupidly, in love.

"Flowers for a flower," he said and she held them closely when they walked down the avenue. She smiled but it faded a littler when she thought of what she was going to say.

"Byron," she said "Byron there's something I need to tell you."

He looked at her with a serious face at the worried tone of her voice.

"I'm pregnant," and there it was, the end of the perfect relationship.

"Will you marry me?" he blurted out.

When they came home to his place and he laid her carefully down on the bed and he kissed her slowly, Florence thought again that she couldn't be happier. It was a dance on roses.

But what Florence always forgot, was that roses had thorns.

----

They washed themselves off in the sea. Even Fox had somehow managed to get covered in fruit and mud. Kay wondered if this would be a tradition for her every time she was out of the camp and glanced at Fox. Last night she had actually heard him cry, poor guy, but it wasn't her problem she reminded herself.

"We should head back," Kate told her when they walked up to the beach again.

"Why? We haven't found Claire or Owen yet," Kay said "and this is way nicer than back at the camp, we can almost be ourselves if it weren't for Fox."

"That's what I'm talking about, look at him," Kate nodded at Fox's direction.

Fox looked like he was at the edge of tears.

"So?" Kay raised an eyebrow.

"So we should take him back, he looks devastated!"

"You take him back Kate," Kay said to her "I won't go back."

Kate's eyes widened "what do you mean?"

"I won't go back, not now and not after we find them."

"Why?" Kate asked.

"Because of you Kate, because of you and everything you've done, I can't pretend to be like you anymore, because I'm not. This is my new beginning."

Kate looked stunned.

"I am not going back."

----

She felt the sweat drip down her nose and she was afraid, so afraid. Peter had a hand on her leg and her heart beat in her ears.

Any second now, any second now…

"Katherine is making pancakes for dinner!" he said cheerful and squeezed her leg tighter.

Kaylee didn't say anything.

"Won't that be nice darling?" he looked away from the road and smiled at her. "And afterwards you and I could play a little game."

She still didn't say anything but as his hand stared to trail she closed her fist.

"Won't that be nice?"

"WATCH OUT!" Kay shrieked.

The horse ran up on the road and desperately Peter tried to avoid it. He lost control as the brakes didn't work. The car went over the reeling and slammed into the water.

Kaylee screamed when the water surrounded them. She hit her head and blood started to drip down her face. She could barely think but she had to get out. The seatbelt pressed against her body and she tried to cut herself loose. Small runnels of black water began to slip in.

"No!" she shouted and managed to pull the seatbelt off. She looked to her left.

"Kay… Kay…" Peter whispered. Blood dripped down his face and his left arm was crushed. Kay cried out in frustration and tried to break the car door's glass.

"He- help me…"

She kicked and hit the door, it wouldn't open.

"Help me Kay… please…"

Suddenly the glass broke and water rushed in. Peter screamed. She pulled herself out and swam. Her legs and arms felt like rocks and her lungs cried for air. She could hear the muffled dying screams but as the cold night air hit her face they stopped.

She laid on the shore to the forest for a while. Saw the bubbles from the car vanish. She was tired and bleeding. But she had never felt safer in her life. Even though she was in the middle of nowhere, even though she was at the edge of a dangerous forest she knew the man she'd killed could never hurt her again.

She laughed and coughed up water a bitter taste filled her mouth and she slowly pulled herself up on her two feet, she stumbled into the dark.

And so the time of running began.

----

Sun ignored the surprised comments and questions as she made her way to Jack and Brian; he had pulled up some kind of curtain around him and Jack looked surprised up when she came in. Sun gasped when she saw how damaged Brian was.

"His… his leg…" she whispered and looked at Jack who had tears in his eyes.

"Yes he may never be able to use- wait, you speak English?"

Sun nodded and Jack gaped at her before he remembered Brian and continued to sew his arm up.

"I think I might be able to help you, I have studied to be a nurse."

"Thank, thank you Sun, can you hold him, like – like this…" he said and showed her how to do it.

"I'm going to snap his other leg back into place again," he said and dried the sweat from his upper lip away. "You need to hold him steady, can you do that?"

"Yes," she answered.

Jack took a deep breath. Brian screamed.

--

Charlie dried away his tears while he walked to the place where he could find a solution for his pain. It hurt. He didn't know why it hurt so much but it did that Claire wasn't there.

He stumbled on and breathed out in relief when he came to the tree, he dug his dirty nails into the ground. Then he started to dig a little to the left, closer up to the tree, away from the tree, he stood up and looked around. Where the hell was his stash? He needed it; he needed it now more than ever. It was the only thing… oh god, he needed it.

Who had taken it?

He glanced down at the ground before him and saw out of the corner of his eye a ring.

--

Jack had told almost everyone to leave the caves and after an argument Shannon gave in and with the help of Allan she and Rosalie had found a good spot to stay for a while. The ground wasn't so full of stones or twigs and the sun shone in from the branches, it was quite beautiful.

"Try to stand up." Shannon stood up in front of Rosalie.

"Shan, I can't even move my legs," Rosie told her and sighed when she saw the resolute face of Shannon's. She took a deep breath and with all she could muster she tried to make her left leg twitch again. Nothing happened.

"I can't," Rosalie complained.

"Yes you can!" Shannon told her but also seemed a bit thrown off.

"If I cannot feel my legs how can I move them?" Rosalie asked with a teary voice.

"All right," Shannon said and then looked around for something sharp. She broke of a twig of a tree and then pressed it into Rosalie's leg.

"OUCH! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?" she screamed and massaged her leg. Shannon was beaming with pride.

"You felt it!" she yelled and ignored the blue mark spreading on Rosalie's leg. Rosalie grimaced and cast a glare at Shannon's way.

"Then why can't I move my legs?"

Shannon didn't have an answer.

----

"So where did you go to school?" Lalita asked Rosalie and leaned forward and took a sip of the wine.

Rosalie was staring at Lalita's beautiful dress, hair and makeup and hadn't heard what she said.

"Rosie?" Lita said.

"Wha- what?"

"I just asked you where you went to school." Lalita frowned and the lack of attention. Rosalie stuttered nervously.

"We-well I went- went-" in her nervousness she had waved with her hand and she accidentally knocked over her glass of wine – on Lalita.

She stood up with a shout and Rosalie stuttered an apology. The rest of the date went in the same manner. Rosalie didn't know what to say, how to act and at the end when Lalita drove her home she rushed away without even saying goodbye.

She cried into her pillow, she felt like a failure. Why couldn't she do something right?

"Mama," Eva whispered, she stood in the doorstep into her mother's room "why are you crying?" she asked ands crawled into her bed. Eva took Rosalie's hand.

"Because I'm sad," Rosalie answered and Eva stroked her hair.

"When I'm sad I sing," Eva said with a serious voice and Rosalie smiled. "I can sing for you if you want to."

Rosalie nodded and thought she had done one thing right in her life as Eva started to sing.

----

Florence stared at the waterfall silently. The small drops seemed too quiet when the scream from Brian was heard. A tear fell down her face.

"Are you crying?" Sean had walked up to her. Jack had refused their help.

"No," Flor answered and blinked away the tears forming in her eyes.

"It's okay if you are."

"Shut up."

"All I say is that I know-"

"You don't know anything Sean. You don't know me," he was taken aback by her fury and was suddenly taken by how she looked. With long black hair instead of blonde, grey eyes instead of brown.

She swallowed back the lump in her throat "I don't even like you!" she told him, but it was more like she was having a conversation with herself. She pushed him to the side when she rushed away and left him looking after her.

----

It was like in one of those really cheesy movies. He was talking to one of his friend when he looked up and saw her eyes across the dance floor. Time slowed down, they started to walk towards each other – and then a girl walking by spilled her drink all over his clothes.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" she said frenzied. Sean looked down at his clothes and frowned.

"I... I got tissues here-" she grabbed some napkins from the table and tried to dry off the wine off his clothes, which was impossible.

"Uh…"

"The bathroom!" she shouted and dragged him to the small lavatory, two girls were applying makeup and she rudely kicked them out.

"It's okay," he said when she grabbed more paper.

"Well your clothes are ruined."

"I don't really care," he said honestly.

"Oh don't be such a guy!" she snapped at him.

"Thank you for being so kind," he answered sarcastically and suddenly noticed that the frantic, wine-spilling girl in front of him was very pretty. She had blonde curly hair, brown eyes and was tall. She wore a red dress and a silver necklace.

"Well, there's one way you can repay me for my clothes," he said and grinned. She looked at him doubtful.

"A date," Sean explained.

"I'm Sarah," she said and smiled.

"I'm Sean."

--

"It feels like someone is watching us," Wendy whispered to Sayid who looked around the jungle at her words.

"It's just paranoia," he told her and continued to walk after Sawyer.

"Just because she's paranoid doesn't mean they ain't coming to get you," Bonnie put in when she half ran up to Sawyer.

"Hey," she said.

"Hello princess," he answered her and lifted some branches and they walked through.

"So, Sayid's a pretty smart guy and Wendy's not an idiot either but I am the only one of us who has noticed that we have walked by that tree once before," she said and pointed to an old, black tree beside them.

"What's your point?"

"My point is that you don't know where we are going!"

"I know."

"Oh yeah?" she said and raised an eyebrow at him.

"Will you please stop talking?" he asked and Bonnie glared at him.

"And so now you're mad at me?" Sawyer spat, Bonnie looked down.

"You are different," she said and he picked up his pace.

----

Birthdays were special. And to Bonnie McQueen it was no difference, except that when most children got five presents, she got fifty. And when most children invited over her friends, she invited over her enemies.

She was just putting her signature on the invitation cards when her father and her stepmother came into her room. Lydia, her stepmother was wearing a ridiculous green outfit that looked like it had cost a fortune – which it had. Bonnie chuckled and Lydia frowned and looked down at her clothes.

"Bonnie dear," her father said and sounded quite harsh in those words.

"Yes?"

"I'm announcing I'm marrying Lydia."

They both took a step backwards when they saw the wrath from in Bonnie's eyes. She closed her fists and pressed her lips hard together.

"Is that so?" she said and tried to press down her fury.

"Yes."

"Well I'm announcing I'm moving out."

"Bonnie-" her father shouted after her when she hurried out of the room. Angry tears fell down her face and she stormed out of the house.

She didn't know where she was going, she didn't know the time. But it didn't matter, she found herself walking through streets and parks she'd never seen before. Suddenly her legs protested and she started to gasp for air.

"A few cents miss?"

Bonnie looked up and saw a little girl in front of her with an English accent. She had a large tomato nose and red flushed spots in her long face, behind her a few steps away a man glanced at them both.

"What?" Bonnie asked and woke up to reality.

"Some money for food," the little girl chirped again and held out her hand.

"Why don't you ask your father for that?" Bonnie snapped at her and the girl looked over her shoulder.

"He's not my father," the little girl whispered and looked down at the ground.

"Well I won't be giving you money," Bonnie told her "it's bad to beg for cash, now get out of my way!"

Bonnie stomped as fast as she could further down the road, her legs burned and so did her lungs.

"Please miss!" the girl shouted after her.

Bonnie halted when she had rounded the corner and breathed heavily as she leaned back against the wall. She looked around, she hadn't been there before. She had a lump in her throat as she wondered where she was. She didn't' have her cell on her.

"Excuse me!" she stopped a scabby looking girl walking by. She measured Bonnie.

"Can you tell me where I am?"

The girl let out a harsh laugh and rolled her eyes at Bonnie, then she took up a gun and Bonnie screamed.

"Your money, _miss_."

----

Florence sat outside the caves and waved to Shannon and Rosie who just came back, Shannon practically carried Rosalie. Flor didn't know she was that strong. After a while Charlie came back too and she knew from where. And if it were possible, he looked even more horrible.

"Hello," she greeted him and cursed in her mind because her voice was shivering. Charlie noticed how nervous she was.

"Where were you?" she asked, and brought even more suspicion on herself.

"Just out… walking…" he looked at her distrustful. She nodded with guilt in her eyes.

"Didn't you use to wear a ring?" he asked. Flor looked down at her hand and surprise started to show on her face. It was enough of an answer for Charlie.

"Would you like to take a walk?" he asked suddenly.

"Uh... okay," she said wary. She stood up and they both, on guard for the other walked into the jungle.

--

What's your blood type?" Jack asked Brian again and didn't get an answer; he sighed and put his head into his hands.

"Jack," he looked up and saw Sun.

"Oh hi Sun," he said with unease.

"I brought his," she held up some plants and walked up to Brian. Jack still wasn't used to hear her speak English.

"What's that?"

"Something that will make him wake up," she said and put it underneath his nose.

"Sun I don't really got time for-"

Brian opened his eyes and looked bewildered around.

"Brain!" Jack exclaimed and Brian tried to get out words. "Brian, what's your blood type?" he asked. Brian's mouth trembled.

"I…" he whispered "I… don't… know…"

Sun gasped and met Jack's eyes.

"Am I going to die?" Brian managed to get out.

"Listen to me Brian. You are not going to die."

"I… I heard… flight… 815… someone…"

Sun stroked his blood dried hair.

"You don't have to talk," Jack said with a gentle voice but Brian continued.

"Cl... Claire… bla- black rock…"

"We haven't found them yet," Sun said with tears in her eyes.

"Locke… he… the hatch… Claire…"

"Locke!" Sun blurted and Jack turned around. Locke stood aside and watched them silently.

Jack took a deep breath.

"We need to talk."

--

"All right, who votes for getting back to the twilight zone?" Dom said as the rain started to fall.

"I do," Kate said and looked at Fox who nodded eagerly. Kaylee didn't say anything. "We can take a shortcut through the forest." Kate glanced at her.

"Let's go!" Dom exclaimed and tried to make a conversation with Fox as they stepped into the water filled jungle. It didn't work very well as Fox only could manage to stutter yes or no.

Kate trailed behind and walked beside Kaylee who still refused to acknowledge their conversation earlier.

"So was it all big talk?" Kate said bitter. "The talk of how you were going to leave."

"No, it wasn't," Kay said simply "I'm leaving."

"Because it looks like you're going with us back!" Kate growled at her.

"If you're hurt you can just say so," Kaylee muttered but Kate didn't answer.

----

"Your father has passed away."

They all looked at him, waited for the tears, the anger, the fury or broken sadness. When he started to cry, they embraced him. The doctor's looked sympathetic before leaving and the nurse patted his shoulder.

It was tears of happiness.

But Matthew, his brother wasn't crying at all, or showed any happiness or anger at all. He just stared in front of him, eyes on the wall, mouth slightly open in shock. It had happened.

A car crash, the most fatal thing in the world, it killed millions. A drunk driver, a road turn, car smashed into a tree and the driver dead.

No more beatings, no more alcohol, they were free.

He continued to cry, but now of misery.

----

Locke awaited Jack's fury and saw it build up underneath the surface. Jack had a problem controlling his feelings, and right now those feelings were turned against Locke.

"What the hell happened?" he asked.

"It was an accident. We were out hunting and he fell down on some rocks."

"Some rocks huh?"

"Yes Jack, rocks, also called stones."

"Where did you go, you and Boone?"

"Why would we stay?" Locke grinned and Jack glared.

"Jack!" Sun screamed and he lifted a finger at Locke, as to say we are not done yet before he left.

Locke heard the groans and painful screams from Brian and sighed. He walked out from the caves to Boone waiting outside. They were going to the hatch.

--

Night had fallen again. But almost none of the survivors slept.

"What did you want Charlie?" Flor asked finally when she saw the moon up on the sky.

"What?" he asked.

"You obviously want something."

"I want to know what you have done with my stash."

Florence swallowed and bit her lip "I don't know what you are talking about," she lied.

Charlie's rage was burning inside of him and he took a hard grip of shoulders and pressed her up against a tree. She winced and tried to get out of his grip.

"What did you do with my stash?" he asked again, eyes burning.

"I- I burned it," she gasped and flinched.

_Doog si nottub eht, doog si nottub eht, doog si nottub eht. _

"What's that?" Flor whispered and Charlie let go of her.

Whispers, small voices were heard from the trees around them. Flowing in the air, some louder, angry and some more like dreamy words randomly picked out from a book.

_Dab si nottub eht, dab si nottub eht, dab si nottub eht._

_Sarah, is that you?_

_Open, open!_

_They are all dead Fo-_

But more fragments could not be heard. The whispers sank into each other and all they could hear was it, not what the whispers said.

"Who's there?" Charlie shouted out. "Hello?"

"Charlie…" Florence grabbed his wrist and she was shaking slightly "I don't think there's anyone there…" they backed slowly and the whispers grew louder.

_It'll come back around little flower… it'll come back around…_

They breathed in shorts beats of fear and suddenly Flor let go of Charlie's hand and went away in a spurt but Charlie stayed and looked baffled around.

_It'll come back around little flower… it'll come back around…_

_--_

"We need to open the hatch now!" Locke roared.

"NO!" Boone screamed at Locke "Brian's dying and all you care about is this!" Boone pointed at the hatch.

"Brian was a sacrifice-"

"HE'S NOT DEAD!"

"Dying, and he will die."

"NO!" Boone screamed, anger and pain lashed across his face and he stomped on the hatch.

"Boone, Boone stop! Boone stop!" Locke pleaded and suddenly Boone went still.

From underneath his feet a light came and shone straight up into the night sky. Boone quickly jumped off the hatch and together they stared at the light. Their eyes wide at the unexpected turn of events.

_--_

Charlie stared at Flor sitting at the other side of the cave. She was listening to Shannon and Rosalie talking but her eyes were far away. She had refused to say anything about the whispers in the forest. And the little they understood.

"It'll come back around, little flower" Charlie whispered for himself and continued to gaze at her, didn't Florence mean flower in a language? She laughed nervously when Shannon said something and then her eyes went dull again, she then excused herself and said she was going back to the beach.

It'll come back around little flower.

He wondered what it meant.

--

They had made camp in the middle of nowhere in the middle of nowhere as Bonnie put it.

Wendy glanced over her shoulder and looked into the black jungle. The flames from the fire warmed her up but she still felt eerie cold inside.

"It still feels like someone's watching," she whispered and turned to Sayid.

"I still say it is paranoia Wendy."

"I still say we're lost," Bonnie glared at Sawyer.

"We are not lost!"

"We so are!"

"We are _so_ not!"

"Can you two teenagers just get a room already?" Wendy spat at them and laid down on the ground and pulled the blanket over her head.

--

"Hey Allan!" Claret shouted and waved. She had just come out of the forest, and this time she didn't feel sad, panicked or upset. She felt actually quite good about herself.

"Wow you look cheerful," Allan said and grinned and they walked together to the beach camp.

"Yes, I've realized I got nothing to be scared of."

Allan raised an eyebrow in disbelief.

"Well, okay, I got many things to be scared of – but, I feel like I can maybe feel safe again."

"I haven't seen her today," Allan blurted out after a moment of silence. "Somehow I now miss it."

"They day isn't over yet," Claret said.

"Yes I know… but it still feels like I won't ever see her again."

Claret halted and took out something from the pocket of her jeans. It was a wrinkled photograph.

"He thought you might want it," she said and smiled faintly.

It was a picture of his daughter.

He swallowed back the lump in his throat "I guess I did get to see her again."

--

"He needs blood," Jack told Sun who had yet gone to sleep, but she looked awfully tired.

"We can wait another day."

"Yes I know."

"Then you need to get some sleep," she said.

"No… no… I need to-"

"Play hero? Sorry to break the illusion Jack but even super heroes sleep," Lorraine came in "got to sleep," she said and Sun knew she meant her. She left.

"I told Shannon to get you in the morning."

"Yeah well I was busy," Lorraine said, a moment of silence. "How bad is he?"

Jack had almost forgotten that she couldn't see "he's really bad Lori."

"Bad in as bad to be good soon or bad is in mortal coil bad?"

"Can you speak like a normal person?" Jack asked her irritated.

"Tried that, it was too boring."

"He's bad."

Silence again.

"I'll watch him for you. Go get some rest Jack, you need it."

Jack nodded and brushed past her and out to the cave.

He wouldn't get any rest.

--

The morning came too soon.

Florence had barely gotten any sleep; all she could think about was the words in the jungle. She hadn't told anyone about it. Flor looked out at the waking survivors at the beach and saw Sean that was on his way to the raft. With embarrassment she thought of what she had said to him.

Then she thought of the ring she used to have on her hand. And how she had lost it without even thinking about it.

"Hey! Sean!" she shouted and ran up to him. He looked at her surprised.

"I want to help."

She saw him measuring her and she rolled her eyes "I won't go all freaky on you again."

"No it's okay, it was stressful with Brian and everything," he said.

"Yeah I guess," she wanted to tell him it; she wanted to tell someone, her fears, what she wanted. But when they started to build on the raft she knew she couldn't share that with him. Not yet at least.

--

Brian was dying, his life was ending.

Jack had a choice, to maybe stop it, or maybe make it happen.

Lorraine stood by his side, needle ready. All he had to do was to say yes.

A simple yes between life and death.

"Jack?" she asked gently.

"Yes," he said and made his decision and hell he hoped he did the right one as the blood started to pump from him to Brian.

--

"It's more important than ever now," Locke said to Boone "that we open the hatch." Boone nodded in agreement.

"But we still don't know how," he whispered.

"I think we need to speak with Brian."

"But he's…"

"Not yet."'

They had arrived at the caves again and Boone and Locke entered, they saw Lorraine sitting by the waterfall drinking water and the curtains were closed around Brian.

"I'll go," Boone said and Locke nodded. Jack was not too keen about him now.

"Hey Jack-" Boone's words got stuck in his throat when he saw Brian. He saw Jack sitting by Brian's side, giving Brian his blood.

"Hello Boone," he answered with a hoarse voice.

"Is… is he going to be all right?" Boone hated that his voice shivered. Jack didn't answer.

"Has, has he said anything?"

"Yeah, he has muttered about our plane and some hatch and Claire."

"Claire?" Boone asked surprised.

"Yeah and some black rocks, I figured maybe those were the rocks he fell on?"

"Fell on?" Boone asked and then remembered Locke's cover story. "Yeah, yeah right uh, he fell on the black rocks."

They went silent until Jack said "I didn't know you two were that good friends," when he saw the tears in Boone's eyes.

"We used to hunt together remember?"

Boone stared at Brian and then remembered that Locke was waiting for him. He excused himself and he and Locke left the cave, when they were outside Locke motioned for him to speak.

"He has been talking, but mostly nonsense about Claire and some black rock."

"Claire and a black rock?"

"Yeah."

Locke frowned, "Didn't Margo and Zidler find Claire's diary?"

--

They had stopped to rest underneath an enormous tree. It was fascinating and Kate found that she could barely keep her eyes way from the large branches. It was beautiful.

"I'm not going back with you," Kay suddenly interrupted the silence. Dom's head flew up and Fox stopped the stuttering.

"What?" Dom asked surprised but Kate didn't look away from the tree above. She just listened.

"I don't want to go back Dom, I think I'm going to keep searching and, you know look around."

"Well you're not going alone-"

"Yes I am."

"But what if you end up like those guys in eaten alive!" Dom didn't even need to explain the plot of that film further.

"You can't stop me."

"Watch me!"

"Shut up both of you," Kate spat and still didn't look at them. "If Kay wants to go let her go!"

Kate heard Kay stand up and walk away; Dom muttered something under his breath and Fox was silent.

Kate blinked away her tears.

--

Boone saw Sean and Flor work on the raft, then he saw Margo and Zidler close to them. Apparently helping them out, but it looked more like they were taking it apart than together.

"Margo!" he shouted and she looked up.

"Hi Boone!" she said with a cheerful voice.

"I was wondering if you still got Claire's diary," he said and smiled.

"Yeah we kept it, but we haven't read it. Not that Zidler hasn't tried."

"Well, Locke and I thought that there maybe could be some more clues and stuff in it-"

"You want to read it?"

"Well…"

Margo glared, Boone swallowed.

"Diaries are personal," she said with a defiant stare.

"Yes but you know me," he tried to grin charming like Dom but failed but Margo couldn't help but draw on her lips when she saw how hard he tried.

"All right, smile no more, I got it in my bag come on," they started to walk across the beach towards the camp. Talking and laughing. Zidler stared after them.

--

"You got it?" Locke asked Boone.

"I got it," Boone smiled "and I've looked through it a bit and you can't guess what I found!"

Locke didn't have to guess as Boone started to talk again immediately:

"Here, look at this page!"

"_I keep dreaming of the black rock, I try to run away from it but I can't,_" Locke read out loud.

"The black rock! Brian was talking about it; it must be some kind of weird sign!"

"Wait," Locke said, but not even he could hide is excitement. "Rosalie gave me some notes Sawyer found while he was in hostage. She couldn't understand it but look-" he pointed at something that looked like a map of the island.

"Rocher Noir" he read "it means black rock in French."

For a second they stood fallen at all they had uncovered in the last moments.

"I guess you and I are going on a long hunting trip," Locke said and smiled.

--

"Sorry," Claret whispered.

"For what?" Allan said and tried to hide his tears from Claret.

"For giving you the picture, you had just let her go and I went and-"

"It's not your fault, I'll always miss Ellie, nothing can make the pain go away."

"Perhaps not, but you must at least put her to rest."

Allan looked into Claret's eyes.

"I got an idea."

----

"What is the think of you?"

"What, what do you mean mom?" Claret asked and jumped when her mom slammed her hand in the table.

"Why don't you listen to me child!" she roared.

"So- sorry," Clairy whispered, she didn't want to fight with her mother and was happy when she calmed down.

"Now, how are you?" her mother asked. Her pale eyes were sunken back into her skull and her hair looked greyer every time Clairy came to see her at the institute.

"I am really good mom," Clairy whispered "I accidentally made a sheep escape from the farm though."

"I think someone is after me," her mother leaned forward and whispered out of the corner of her mouth. Like she hadn't heard one thing Clairy said.

"Mom, no one's out to get you-"

"You are one of them!" she pointed a shaky finger at Clairy.

"No- no Mommy, it's me Clairy…"

"You are dead!" she spat and screamed "You are dead! YOU ARE DEAD!"

Clairy cried when her grandparents picked her up.

--

It was night once again.

Sawyer led the way before them, the torch in his hand. Wendy trailed after, tired and worn out. Sayid yawned but kept his pace and behind them all walked Bonnie. Her face dirty but she had a determined look as she kept staring at the back of Sawyer's head; he turned around and saw her. He gazed down and continued to look forward.

Jack sat by Brian. He was pale in the face as he gave his blood to save the boy's life. Brian was laying still, unaware of the people desperate to save him. Lorraine looked in with a frown on her face. Gently she pulled the needle out of Jack's arm. He looked devastated but didn't even protest. She slowly felt her way up to his face and stroked his chin. She didn't say anything, just stood before him, to help him let go.

Zidler and Margo were at the beach and dipped their feet in the water. Suddenly a big wave hit them and they got soaked to the bones. Margo screamed and felt her hair and Zidler laughed. A bit away Dominic, Kate and Fox walked out from the forest. Dom and Kate walked together towards the camp. Fox looked over at the two best friends sitting by the water and smiled faintly. He then turned to his left and saw the survivors greet the searchers returning and then to the forest. Nobody came to greet him.

Allan sat up by the fire and held the picture of his daughter. She wasn't smiling at it; she looked broody and had just stomped in the ground of anger over not getting to spend more time with Megan. But Allan smiled slightly. Claret suddenly appeared in front of him and without a word pointed to the exit of the caves and Allan nodded. Together they walked to a little beautiful place with red flowers scattered over the land. Claret had dug a little hole into the ground and placed a mix between yellow long flowers and with purple leaves she had spelled put the word Ellie. Allan put the picture into the ground and together they covered it. Swiftly a wind came and took the leaves away into the air and Allan cried.

The survivors had gone to sleep at the caves. Florence was still there, a few feet away from Sean's sleeping form. She looked at him breathe slowly and then pulled herself up and walked barefoot out into the jungle. Her feet soon started bleeding because of the sharp twigs and stones. She grimaced but just kept walking. Soon she came to a big rock, it had an eerie shade of red and by its bottom she pulled away the leaves that were covering her treasure.

She stared at the little bags of heroin and she took up one in her hand. She took a deep breath.

Would it heal her pain?

--

**Author's Notes: **Thank you for your reviews! And for your characters, unfortunately I will ONLY accept an even number of boys and girls and as it is… I got two boys and many more girls.

So keep sending applications in! Even if you already have!

Slow chapter, yes I know, but a filler chapter. It was needed for the fast pace of the next one so I hope you won't be too disappointed.

Please, please review, reviews make me so happy! And when I get reviews I want to update!

Namaste.


	10. A Demon in my View

_In its autumn tint of gold —  
From the lightning in the sky  
As it pass'd me flying by —  
From the thunder, and the storm —  
And the cloud that took the form_

When the rest of Heaven was blue  
Of a demon in my view —

_- Alone by Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 8, A Demon in my View**

--

Wendy fingered with the gun in her hands, slid it along her fingers. She held it up and down and observed its lines, its form. She was absolutely terrified of it.

"Just waiting to shoot someone huh?" Wendy looked over her shoulder at Bonnie, who nodded at Wendy's gun, and patted her own.

"You seem awfully used to have one of those." Wendy jumped over the small stream in the jungle; the sun was blazing above them. The branches didn't do much help from the heat.

"I used to have faked ones in a couple of movies," Bonnie's secure voice faltered when she found herself with water over her legs. Wendy chuckled. Bonnie started to whine and they decided to take a break again.

"Not another break!" Wendy complained. That was all they seemed to do, never getting any further in the search and rescue mission. Annoyed she left them brooding by the stream and walked behind a couple of trees, bless cool shadows.

CRACK!

Wendy spun around on the spot. He hands shook hard when she pulled up the gun. She pointed it straight through the trees. She waited and wondered if she should call for Sayid.

She breathed heavily in through her nose, but there didn't seem to be anyone there, she swallowed and turned slowly around. She was getting paranoid –

"Wait!" the boy protested when she held the gun at him. Wendy almost dropped it on the spot.

"Wait, I want to help you I'm not like those –"

"SAYID!" Wendy screamed.

"No! Please, I just want to help," the boy was frantic. "I can help you, you need to follow the stream and then -" his eyes widened, a crack was heard from behind.

PANG!

Wendy had fired the gun.

--

Her mother took her hand, it was sweaty and she held it too hard. Wendy shifted in her seat uncomfortably and tried to ignore her mother's looks of sympathy as she stared straight forward.

The priest continued to talk with his toneless, slow voice and an easy rain started to fall. Wendy saw out of the corner of her eye Jasmine with all the pride she could muster try to cover her hair from the rainfall.

"Linda will be missed by all of us…" the priest said in the same voice and Wendy wondered how he could miss her, he hadn't even known her. He had never seen her smile by the fence around their school; he had never seen her get angry at the teachers or sing with her awful voice a rainy Sunday afternoon. As the coffin sank into the ground Linda's mother burst into tears and held onto Jasmine tight who looked even more uncomfortable than Wendy.

A little boy started to whine about ice-cream, Linda's baby cousin started to cry, a cell phone started to beep. One by one everyone left the hole in the ground and wished they could put something more colorful on than the worn out black clothes.

Wendy pulled her hand away from her mothers and walked closer and closer to the hole. The priest was busy talking with someone she didn't know and Wendy peered into the hole. Saw the dirt fall on it, the red roses got covered by mud and water. She saw some light, and wondered how there could be light in the ground. She leaned to see closer…

"Wendy!" her mother shouted and Wendy took a step back. Her ponytail flying behind her as she ran up to her mother who with a strong motion took her hand again.

She could see some of the guests staring at her when they entered the reception. The best friend, the little girl who only had one friend and now that friend was dead. The adults waited for her tears, the children waited for her to walk by so they could talk about her.

"Hasn't shed a tear," Wendy heard two women speaking behind her as she sat down on a couch, her mother went to use the restroom and she listened to their conversation.

"My boy Harry says she doesn't even miss Linda, says he saw her laugh yesterday."

"Well children don't always understand…"

"But still Dolores, she must feel something about her friend's death. It must be because she's fatherless."

"Yes, everyone knows how those children end up."

"Harry also came home and said that she was the one to push Linda into the stream, said they had a fight. Of course I told him not to spread such awful rumors, but I must admit that Carmen hasn't done a very good job raising her, she got this awful temper and she's not even pretty."

Wendy's cheeks burned. Linda had told her not to care about what people would say. But it was hard. Linda and her face disappearing as a reflection in the water.

"I say that all children whom are fatherless should have a father figure. If my husband would die I would remarry just for my children's sake. Otherwise they could end up, like you know."

There was a moment of silence as both women took a sip of their tea.

"And did you see Carmen's dress?" one of the women said after a while. "Awful, awful thing... Oh, hello Carmen."

Wendy looked over her shoulder and saw her mother smiling to the two ladies before she sat down beside her. She hadn't heard anything of what they had said.

"Here you got a cup of hot tea mi amor, be careful it's really warm."

Wendy took it in her hands. It burned. She stood up and her mother looked after her as she walked over to the two women that sat around a small, round table.

"Oh hello dear," one of them said. And her red lips curled up in a smile.

Wendy poured her tea over them.

--

"I want to get on that raft!" Florence was red in the face of anger.

"I'm sorry but there are not enough spots left!" Michael roared back and didn't look sorry at all.

"I need to be on it!" Florence shrieked.

"I have already promised Lori and Jin they're getting on –"

"You must have some space left!"

"Yeah, for my _son_."

Florence bit her teeth together and closed her fist. Sean saw where it was going.

"Flor, c'mon," he said and took her arm. She shrugged him off and stomped away from them, the fury glowing from her.

Sean wondered what had happened to the happy girl he'd met.

--

"A long hunting trip?"

"Yes Shannon, a hunting trip," Boone answered her, his tone tired. He lifted up his backpack and nodded to Locke.

"Well you can't just go!" Shannon snapped and ran after them out of the caves.. They both ignored her and disappeared behind the trees. "Fine! If you want to have a romantic getaway with your boyfriend you can just say so!"

"Shannon calm down," Rosalie said in a peaceful voice and Shannon glared at her.

"You don't understand anything!" she rushed off and Rosalie sighed and started to read Watership Down again.

"Hello?" Lori came out from the cave's entrance and turned her head confused around.

"I'm here," Rosalie answered and put the book down.

"Who?"

"Rosalie."

"Right the paralyzed chick," Lori said.

You're the one to talk Rosalie thought. "Was it something you wanted?"

"I needed someone who could help me beat Jack off his high horse."

"Come again?"

"He still thinks he can save Brian."

Silence laid itself between them. Rosalie twisted her fingers awkwardly and Lorraine swallowed.

"I have been praying for him," Rosalie whispered.

"Praying, what use got praying?" Lori spat. "If there was a god he would've helped Brian by now. If there was a god we wouldn't even be here!"

Rosalie didn't answer her. She wished she could walk away but she couldn't. Lori frowned and looked ashamed of herself for a moment.

"Brian's going to die," she whispered. "Nothing can save him. Can you help me get Jack to understand?"

"Of course."

--

"I… I'm so, so sorry… I was just – I…"

"Wendy back away," Sayid repeated and Bonnie took Wendy in the arm and dragged her off. Wendy gazed at Sawyer and Sayid holding the young guy down. They talked to each other and Bonnie turned Wendy's face away from them.

"What did he say?"

"Wha- what?" Wendy whispered, still in shock after what she had done.

"What did he say, Wendy sweetie, what did he say?" Bonnie asked gently.

"He... he uh, he told me about… he said he could help us," she looked at Bonnie. "Was he telling the truth?"

"Bullet flew right through his shoulder, he's lucky you're a bad shot," Sawyer glared and pulled the gun out of her hands. Wendy rubbed her temple.

"Sorry," she whispered.

"It wasn't her fault!" Bonnie stood up and faced Sawyer. "She was scared, that boy is one of _them_."

They both looked over at Sayid who now after he had patched the guy up was tying him to a tree.

"What did he say Peter Pan?" Sawyer asked Wendy.

"That he could help us."

"Wonderful."

--

"Oh, look, look!" Isabelle shouted and excitedly pulled Wendy's arm. "He's going to do it, I didn't think he would, but he will! Look!"

Wendy turned around and saw Terry Matthews walk over to Quentin James in the cafeteria and she recalled the happenings in the classroom before. Terry had bragged on and on about how strong he was, which Wendy thought probably was a compensation for something else. And Isabelle, being the stupid person she was had dared him to beat up someone.

But to Isabelle's disappointment all Terry did was to sit down beside Quentin and start to talk with him. Isabelle pouted and leaned back in her chair. Wendy rolled her eyes and wished she hadn't chosen to sit down beside her that first day of school.

"Hey, what's he doing?" Wendy asked and interrupted the texting feast Isabelle had. Terry had just stood up and was now arguing loudly with Harry Hatcher. And before anyone reacted, except for Isabelle that was talking pictures with her cell, Terry and Harry started something that for Wendy looked like tug-o-war but with more nosebleeds.

"FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!" the students roared and Wendy dragged Isabelle with her to the ring that started to form.

"Stop!" a teacher protested vaguely. But on Reichand's School the teachers lost all their respect when they first cut the ribbon.

Suddenly there were even more people involved in the fight, which was the best friends of Harry and Terry. And it started to look worse, screams and punches flew and suddenly it weren't that fun anymore. Some students tried to pull the guys off each other a teacher got punched in the stomach. Terry was pushed into a table full with glass and blood ran from his arms.

"WHY WOULD YOU TWO START FIGHTING?" a teacher suddenly screamed and the fighting and shouts stopped. Terry pointed at Isabelle who stood beside Wendy with a hand over her mouth.

"WENDY REYES!" the teacher roared.

--

"Nobody, not even Florence has asked about Kaylee."

"Would you give it a rest Kate?" Dominic said annoyed.

"Why? Because nobody seems to care that she left? That she's gone?"

Dom didn't answer her but clenched his teeth together.

"I can't believe she left us, I can't believe you let her go. After all we've been through after all I've done for her –"

"Shut up!"

Kate looked surprised up and met Dom's furious gaze.

"All right Katie, you're my sister. But you're also the most self centered person on the planet. Always I, I, I. Kay's gone and you were the one who told her to! And now you're annoyed that no one cares that she's gone? Why should they? They didn't know her, hell you where very eager to stop look after Claire and Owen. And you know why? Because they are not _family_. Look after number one, and for me that is you. So yeah I will not go after Kaylee. You will not go after her either, and if you try I'll shoot you."

Kate went silent and bit her lip.

"Stop nagging and do some good, help with the raft, get some water just don't… sit around."

--

"Hey, John Doe what's your name?"

The boy's eyes flickered and he woke up when the water hit his face.

"Sorry," Wendy whispered.

"You – you shot me!"

"Sorry again."

"You are one of them," Sayid glared at him and the boy looked down.

"I was one of them, not anymore. My name is Karl."

"Yeah, and I'm Han Solo. Are you really expecting us to believe anything you say?" Sawyer spat.

"Well… I have been following you."

"I can believe that," Wendy put in, the shock was wearing off and she would give Sayid a big 'I told you so' later.

"I… I just want to help…"

"You kidnap me, my people… who the hell are you people anyway?"

"Uh… actually I'm not so sure about that either."

Sayid looked at Bonnie as to say 'brilliant' and pushed Sawyer rudely aside. Sawyer shouted in protest but Sayid's look shut him up.

"Well, Karl, what is your purpose here?" Sayid asked with a scary calm voice, the boy looked horrified at Sayid.

"Uh, I want – I wanted to help," he whispered.

"What do you want to help us with Karl?"

"I want to help you get your friends back… I know where Claire and Owen are."

--

Sawyer, Sayid and Bonnie were conversing further down the stream out of view of Wendy who guarded the guy she had shot. Wendy didn't say anything as Sayid had told her to do, but she at least wished that they wouldn't have given her the gun back. She was afraid she might shoot him again if he made any hasty moves.

"So," the guy said. "You come here often?" he chuckled.

"Only on weekends," Wendy muttered.

"It's Thursday," he said.

"Time doesn't matter," Wendy straightened up.

"You would be surprised," he looked at her and Wendy looked at him, anger flashing in her eyes.

"Don't try to be all nice. You people took our friends! Kidnapped us! You had no right!" she shouted. He looked worried at her.

"I agree with you. That's why I'm here to help," he said with an honest voice. "I didn't have a choice but to be with this people. But now when you're here I can make a choice. And that choice is to finally do the right thing."

"If you want to do the right thing you should tell us everything about your people and what you want!"

"They don't tell me much."

"Isn't that convenient," Wendy mumbled.

"I can tell you one thing though!" he blurted out and his eyes shone. "There's something you need to know about the people in your camp…"

--

"Jackie, listen up!" Lori supported Rosalie and with great force managed to get her up behind the curtains. Lori panted. "Rosie here got something she wants to say."

Rosalie glared at Lori who defiant didn't meet her eyes. She looked over at Jack who was trying to force down some pills down Brian's throat.

"Jack," she said gently. "You need to stop with what you are doing."

Jack ignored her.

"Brian needs to go in peace, and right now you are not letting him go-"

"He's not going to die," Jack said and didn't meet her gaze.

"Jack please –"

"Shut up Rosalie!" Jack roared at her and Lori flinched beside her. He continued to whisper to Brian and tried to make him swallow.

"JACK!" Rosalie screamed and he jumped and dropped the medicine on the ground. "There are many stages of grief and right now you're going through denial! Believe me I of all people know."

Lori cleared her throat awkwardly. "So, yeah… I'll just go, uh…" she stammered and helped Rosalie sit down before she left them. Rosalie put her hands together and looked at Jack who was looking very interested in a leaf on the ground.

"What do you think Brian would have wanted?"

"He's not dead."

"Yes I know, but what do you think he would have wanted?"

Jack didn't say anything and Rosalie continued. "I thought that to myself after the crash, what would my wife and daughter have wanted me to do? Of course they couldn't answer my question so I asked myself, if it was me who were gone what would I have wanted them to do. And the answer was then clear Jack; I wanted them to be happy, to let me go. Not to surrender and vanish into sorrow, but to breathe the air and know that I wanted that for them," she took a deep breath "What would you have wanted if you were in Brian's position?"

Jack stood silent for a while, the sounds from the stream and his breathing became less. And a serene silence filled the gone sounds.

"I wouldn't want you to waste the medicine on me, I would have wanted you to quietly put me to sleep, I would have wanted everyone to…" he was going to say forget, but it didn't seem like the right word. "I would have wanted everyone to survive."

"Then I guess you know what to do," Rosalie whispered.

--

"He's lying."

"Of course he is," Sawyer answered Bonnie.

"But what if he's not?" Wendy asked. Sayid was now guarding the guy.

"So you're saying he's telling the truth about 'breaking' from his people and escaping away on his merry little spaceship to help us? I don't think so."

"But Sayid say-"

"Listen Kid, you're like what, 13? Let the grownups handle this," Sawyer turned to Bonnie who frowned at him when Wendy rushed off offended. "What?" he asked and she sighed.

"What if Wendy's right, what if he really is telling us the truth?"

"Then we should stake him."

"Sawyer!" Bonnie and Sayid said together. Bonnie in a whining tone and Sayid in a demanding shout. Sayid walked up to them, a knife in his hands.

"I found this on him," he said and held it up. "It's an US army knife."

"Told you so," Sawyer smirked at Bonnie.

"He gave it to me willingly," Sayid said and Bonnie beamed.

"All right, what do you make of this Sherlock?"

"I do not trust him, but I do think he doesn't see eyes to eye with his people, he is convincing on that point."

"Convincing enough to trust?"

"Convincing enough to not alert his people about us."

"So what are we going to do?"

"We can't take him with us."

"Should we just leave him here as alligator food?"

"Maybe two of us should go back with him to the camp –"

"Where did Wendy go?" Bonnie asked suddenly and turned to Sawyer whose eyes widened. They immediately darted beside the stream and over to the dark red trees, the ropes were loose on the ground. Wendy and Karl were nowhere to be seen.

--

The sun shone bright on the sky and Wendy felt her neck burn underneath her hair. A lot of people were on the streets, celebrating that the summer had finally come. Wendy Reyes was celebrating that she had just gotten an apartment. Of course it wasn't that nice, and she suspected there were rats wandering around in the walls at night. But finally she was on her own two feet.

She wandered into an alley and took out her keys, her own keys. She giggled.

"Give me your money," Wendy spun round and saw a gun pointed to her, the hand holding it was shaking and she dropped her keys on the ground. She looked up and met Terry Matthews' eyes.

"Terry?" she asked and his eyes widened. He lowered his hand a little. "Terry Matthews? The idiot who got me thrown out of school?" Wendy couldn't believe it. Now when she looked at the gun in his hand she smiled, she doubted he would fire. Then she got mad.

"Give me your money," he repeated and refused to acknowledge her.

"Yeah right," Wendy said. "If anything you owe me you idiot!"

"I said give me your money!"

"Never, you can stick it up your –"

When she woke up again at the hospital, her mother told her she was stupid and that Matthews had gotten thrown into jail.

--

Kaylee regretted her choice. It had seemed rational at the time. To walk into an endless jungle with barely any water all alone, a treat for flesh eating monsters. And it was just the brightest idea to walk right into an ambush that left her trapped in a net. It was a lot more uncomfortable than some people would think, like Dom, he would totally make some really inappropriate jokes right now if he was there with her.

Which he was not, she remembered that.

Why had she decided to follow that wire thingy anyway? Like electricity could work there, and it led underwater also, electricity didn't work underwater. Or did it? She didn't really know. She was quite hungry. A hamburger would do nice right now. Or maybe some of Kate's awful 'home baked cookies'. Like Kate had any time to bake while being on the run. More like bought out of some shabby old man's car.

She would give anything to have one of those things right now.

She shifted her seat, which was kind of hard since she was, trapped in a net. She laughed at her thoughts, trapped in a net. Who would've thought? She laughed again, a cackling ugly sound. Yes, she was going crazy. Kate would totally say I told you so.

Whispers, she heard whispers from the trees.

"Hello?" she shouted and tried to see where it came from. "Is there someone there?"

_Sarah, Sarah, Sarah how many times have I told you…_

_rood eht nepo, rood eht nepo, rood eht nepo_

"Hello?" she shouted again.

BANG!

The net was released and she slammed into the ground. She screamed in pain and tried to roll over on her back, it felt like her hands were crushed. The muddy ground hurt her eyes and when someone walked up beside her all she could see was a pair of blurry boots.

"Who are you?" the voice sounded distant.

"Kate it's just me, Dom's out getting some food and flirting with random chicks, we'll be back on the road in no time," she muttered. And after a long time without food, water and sleep, a tired Kaylee passed out.

--

"It's like survivors," Dom said to Margo as they were both helping out with building a 'kitchen' as Rose liked to call it.

"Well if you're going to force me to eat bugs I'm out of here," Margo answered and smiled. She had been surprised when Dom just showed up and started helping her bind two logs together, he had just struck up a conversation about some movie and she was glad that he just kept talking.

"Bugs are not that bad," Dom said honestly and Margo chuckled.

"Have you actually eaten creeps?"

"You don't believe I have?" he asked, as if eating bugs was something every cool man had to do.

"I don't think you're brave enough," Margo put her head up high and laughed.

"Are you challenging me?"

"What are you guys talking about?" Zidler had come up to them and Margo beamed at him.

"Dom here is going to eat bugs."

Dom burst out laughing and Zidler looked stressed and muttered something about inside jokes. . Margo looked over at the raft.

"How's it going with the raft?" she asked as Zidler looked like he wanted to say something else but couldn't.

"Don't know. They kicked me out," he looked gloomy.

"Why?"

"Because I might, _accidentally_ tested if the raft could hold itself together…"

"Zidler, what did you do?"

"I kind of… performed a magic trick… with a saw."

Margo and Dom laughed even more and Zidler looked offended.

"Hey, it would have worked if Michael had used the right type of –"

His words got drowned when Florence appeared behind him and hit him over the head. Margo held back her laughter when she saw the fury raging out from Florence. She looked absolutely mad.

"Doesn't anyone of you understand that we got to be rescued!" she yelled and Dom stopped laughing too. "Here you are, building some kind of hotel resort and destroying chances to get rescued when we're being kidnapped, our families think we're dead and we're trapped on this damn hell of an island!"

"Flor listen we didn't mean to –" Dom said but Florence had already taken off. Margo looked down at her feet and mused on what Flor had said. Zidler rubbed his head and wondered if Florence had slept at all over the past days, her eyes were red and she looked sick.

"Well, that was random," Dom said.

--

"Dom?" Kay whispered and opened her eyes. A light flashed and she blinked, her vision was blurry but soon she could make out that she was tied to a table. She tried to move her feet but they were tied up too.

"Where is my Alex?"

"What -" Kay started but screamed as electricity shot through her body, she grimaced and bit her lip hard. A trail of blood ran down her chin and down on her throat.

"Dónde está Alex?"

"I… I don't know…"

Kay screamed again.

"Where is Alex?"

"I don't know who Alex is – please, I'm a survivor of a plane crash… flight 815, from Sydney to LA… please, I just followed a wire on the beach… I didn't know… they, the other survivors tried to find a signal through the transceiver and I just thought –"

"Si quelqu'un m'entend, je vous en prie, venez à notre aide... Il les a tués. Il les a tous tués..."

"What?"

"Who are you?"

"I… I told you, I'm a survivor of flight 815… please…"

"LIAR! I know what you are…"

Kay screamed again.

--

Claret knocked Allan over. She had rushed out of the jungle and looked for him when she tripped over his sitting body.

"Ouch!" he whined and Claret said sorry.

Allan massaged his arm and then gazed at Claret who looked hysterical, she was rubbing her hands together as if to stay warm and she blinked too many times.

"What is it Claret?" he asked her.

"There has been some… difficulties. Allan, I need your help."

--

Fox looked over at Claret and Allan talking further down the beach, they looked worried and he could see their panic building up. Then they turned their gazes at him. Fox swallowed and started to walk the other way, to the camp. He knew Claret and Allan were walking the same direction too.

"Is… is there anything I could he – help with," Fox looked over his shoulder at Claret and Allan, who now had stopped and talked in hushed voices to each other.

"Sure," Dom said and smiled. "You could tell Margo here that there's nothing wrong with using hairspray." Fox saw Margo rolling her eyes as she slammed the hammer a little too hard down at the wood.

"Hair – hairsprays? You use hairspray?" Fox asked and Margo's eyes shone at the thought. Zidler laughed.

"That's why you're defending them despite the environment! You are a guilty user of hair products!"

"Well, look at the sky? Does it seem thinner to you?"

"I don't know. I can't see because there's a demon in my view," Margo joked.

Dom looked embarrassed and even though Fox was practically shaking with nervousness he couldn't help but smile as Margo started to tease him about it. Soon he got the task of re-build anything Zidler had built, and he felt comfortable with the careless happy people. But as the conversation led into Bonnie McQueen, and then to the search. He started to think of Claire. How afraid she had been for her baby's sake, how she had longed after some peanut butter and her bright smile.

He hated himself.

--

When Jack pushed the curtains open, he saw Brian sitting on the bloody blankets. His face was turned into a bright smile and Rosalie stood beside him and they were both shining.

"It's a miracle Jack," Rosalie told him and her eyes glowed. "He's saved."

"Thank you Jack," Brian said and took out his hand. "Thank you for fixing me."

Jack smiled, he saw the halo around Rosalie's head and he took Brian's hand for a shake. But suddenly Brian took a hard grip around his neck and pressed Jack down before him. Jack tried to get out of his grip but Brian held even tighter.

"You killed me Jack!" he whispered harsh. "You killed me! I need to stay alive don't you get it? I need to be alive so I can save the child! You killed me and now the child can't be saved, you let me go Jack! Everyone pays the price now…"

"Jack!" Lorraine shouted and slapped his cheek." Jack you idiot, wake up!"

Jack opened his eyes and stared into the face of Lorraine's. Her eyes weren't turned to his and she didn't know that he had woken up.

"Lori…" he whispered and she let go of him.

"You idiot! You passed out, too much blood giveaway, and no sleep or food either! You are insane Jack!"

Jack though of when he had held the gun at Claret, Lori didn't know anything about insanity. He turned his gaze to the side and to his shock he saw that the spot were Brian had laid was empty.

"Where's Brian?" he asked and Lori stopped muttering swearwords.

"What?" she asked.

"He isn't here beside us."

Lori felt her way to the blankets and her lip trembled when she couldn't feel Brian there.

"What the hell…" she whispered.

"BRIAN!" Jack roared.

--

Charlie gazed over at Florence who was sitting alone by herself at the waterline, eating a mysterious green fruit and drinking water. Now and then her hands twitched and she put her hands to her face as to hide away the tears.

She had lied. Charlie could feel it down to his bones. She had lied; she hadn't burned his stash, no, worse. She had used it. Charlie could feel the withdrawal eating him up. He wasn't going to stop her, say to her that she should quit. He saw Sean walking fast up to her and how she with one look smiled.

No, she was going to lead him right to it.

--

"Hey Flor," Sean said and sat down beside her, she gave him a faint but honest smile and Sean relaxed. She was probably not going to freak out.

"How are you holding up?" he asked. He saw the read marks on her face and hands.

"It feels like I'm dying," Flor admitted. "Like there's some sick disease eating me up inside."

"I think that disease strikes when you miss someone," Sean's gaze lingered on her and she nodded in agreement.

"I tried to act like it was okay before," she whispered. "After the crash, but it isn't. All I can see when I blink is him, when I think it is of him… I…" tears welled up in her eyes and Sean thought of what to say.

"At least you know he's safe," he whispered and felt a lump forming in his throat. Pain and anger flashed across Flor's eyes and she looked down.

"Safe? I have no idea if he's alive!"

"What –"

"I… I just feel so..."

"Guilty?"

Flor looked into his eyes and nodded, surprised that he knew how she felt. He had no idea what she was talking about, but he didn't press her. First she was relieved but now she felt strangely annoyed. How could he be so calm? So patient with her?

She needed something, and she needed it now.

She stood up and without a word she left him alone by the water. Sean wondered if Flor liked to dart away from people and Charlie wondered if Flor was stupid enough not to spot him as he followed after her.

--

"So this is it?" Wendy asked Karl.

"Uh… yeah…" he seemed to have a hard time getting out his words, with the gun pressed at his throat and Wendy standing really close to him. A bit away were heavy, green vegetation on the ground and somewhere in all that mess there was a door that lead underground, or at least if you believed Karl. They had traveled by the stream for a while, and Wendy had a knot in her stomach when she thought of what she had done. But all Sayid, Sawyer and Bonnie did was discuss, never any action.

"So, search and rescue huh?" she asked to herself. The area seemed eerie calm, no sounds of bird chirping or small muffled sounds of animals walking.

"I have already taken out a few… but that was a long time ago. There are maybe many more there right now. And they could have already moved them away from there…"

"And you're telling me this now?" Wendy spat.

"Well you are pointing a gun at me," he excused himself.

Wendy wondered what madness had possessed her when she decided to do this alone.

"All right, I'm going in…"

"We're going in."

"Un chico estúpido," she muttered.

Still with a gun pointed to his head, Wendy and Karl walked out from the trees. No one shot at them and after a while Wendy felt quite secure.

Well, except for the 'people living underground' part.

"Here it is," Karl said.

"It's mud."

"It's what's underneath the mud," Karl dug away the mud and soon dirty metal could be seen. Wendy breathed faster. Karl frowned and wondered who had covered the hatch up again.

"What if someone's there, when we open it?" she asked and she was scared.

"Our people don't work that way."

"Well, how do you work? What the hell are you guys doing?"

Karl looked up and smiled. "We're protecting the island."

--

"Isn't it awfully quiet here?" Boone asked Locke as they walked between the dark trees. Bended over them as if they wanted to crush them.

"The dark territory," Locke whispered and Boone asked no more questions as they continued to trek through the jungle, cutting through vines and trying to keep their balance on the unstable ground. A loud howl was heard and Boone tripped and fell to the ground, he stood up quickly and they both listened after more sounds.

"What was that?" Boone whispered but Locke didn't answer, he just took out his knife.

Another, closer growl, then a clashing noise, a rumble echoed.

"Monster…" Boone whispered.

Then hell broke loose.

--

"I didn't see anything," Rosalie told them and Shannon nodded. "We're the only ones here, everyone has moved to the beach again."

Jack took a deep breath. There were no signs of Brian whatsoever, and it was not like he could have just walked away on his own. Brian was too damaged to do that. But as Lori took a grip of his arm and led him out of the caves, he knew she had a different opinion.

"Nobody could have taken him –"

"The others!" Jack said determined.

"Why would they kidnap a dying guy?"

"Why would they kidnap anyone of us? All we know is that Brian didn't just leave on his own."

"You got to have better theories than the others Jack."

"Do you?" he asked back. And they both stood silent for a moment as they thought.

"Evil twin," Lorraine said after a while. "Maybe aliens."

"I think we should check the beach," Jack said.

Lorraine sighed. "All right, but if it turns out to be a polar bear on roller-blades who has eaten him then I got to say I told you so!"

--

Wendy had expected a dark, endless long climb into the ground, but to her relief it was only a few steps she had to climb down before there was straight ground underneath her feet. A light bulb hanged above their heads and Wendy thought she might die of fear if anyone jumped out of those dark corners. Then she wondered where the electricity came from.

This was a bad idea.

No, that was the understatement of the history. This was a terrible, ridiculous, awful, one fry short of a happy meal idea.

Karl was soundlessly moving over the ground but to Wendy her own steps seemed louder than gunshots. She saw that the bandage around Karl's shoulder was colored red, but didn't have time to think of it more as small voices could be heard. Karl's eyes widened, and Wendy couldn't make out what the people were saying, it sounded distant and strange.

Karl motioned for her to walk closer to the wall and he turned left as the tunnel split into two parts, Wendy looked back at the other end but all she could see was darkness. Here where they walked a light bulb hanged also over their heads and they passed several doors, in one she spotted a bed and in another a storage room. She didn't see any people, but he voices grew louder and they closed in on the door at the end of the tunnel.

"_We have crossed over the eastern down streams, a storm slowed"_ static was heard _"… we have found the…"_ more static _"and they are getting… Phelps says…"_ her words drowned in even more static.

Karl looked confused and Wendy felt just like he looked.

"Are they in there?" she whispered and he nodded to her. They were just outside the door, light came through the door opening. She looked at Karl and together they slammed the door open.

"HANDS UP!" Wendy yelled and waved with the gun. Before she had taken in the sight of the room someone had pushed her on the floor and she tried to kick her attacker.

"Sayid?" she asked and Sayid got off her and helped her up. She looked around the room and saw Bonnie standing by a computer and Sawyer tying a man to a chair. The forty something man had tape over his mouth and he looked directly at her with piercing blue eyes. Wendy looked away and Sayid took the gun from her and took over the task at holding Karl at gunpoint.

The room had a weird oval form, hard stone walls surrounded them and it was empty, except for the chair and the computer.

"How… how?" Wendy asked bewildered.

"I remembered the way," Sawyer said and smirked before he remembered to glare at Wendy. "What the hell were you thinking?" he then roared at her and Bonnie hit him on the arm. She hushed them and Wendy heard the voices coming from the computer.

"_Yes… yes the island, we're on our way. Milou is very… yes…"_

It sounded like someone was talking into the phone. Wendy looked around for an explanation and then turned her gaze again and saw a red dot on the computer screen, it beeped and next to it there were some numbers.

"_Phelps is working on it… Gray will cover the…"_

"What is that?" she asked.

Sayid looked at the man in the chair. "That is our rescue."

--

Wendy asked Ronda Jefferson what happened to her today. Ronda responded with nothing. Wendy doubted that the bruise on her arm meant nothing, and didn't have to sign as she raised her eyebrows. Ronda looked down and signed that the girls had teased her during gym class. Because she couldn't hear the gym teachers orders and had lost for her team.

Wendy hugged the girl, and wished her parents would do something about her problems in school. The worst thing about babysitting was that you weren't supposed to get attached. But she always did.

Later when she had said goodnight to Ronda her parents came home, one hour later than promised.

"Did everything go fine?" Ronda's mother, Susanna asked.

"No," Wendy answered and closed her fist. "Ronda's been having problems at school."

"All children have problems at school," the father answered and took out his keys and put them on the table.

"She's being teased because she's deaf!" Wendy said and tried to control her temper. "Shouldn't you talk to the teachers?"

"Excuse me but you have no right to tell us what to do!" Susanna said. "We won't be bothering the teachers with so small problems –"

"Small problems?" Wendy shouted. "This is your daughter! She came home bruised!"

"Damn right she's out daughter, not yours, here – have you money! Now get out!" he threw the cash her way.

"Can you just stick you heads up your culos and help your child!"

After Susanna found a dictionary and understood the meaning of her words, she was fired. And Wendy was forbidden from seeing Ronda. But one time she saw the little girl on the street, a bag in her hand with candy. Two boys shouted loudly behind her and laughed when she didn't hear them. They reached out their hands to grab the bag.

Wendy decided that interfering wasn't the same thing as seeing.

--

Boone darted through the forest; he pushed away branches, jumped over rocks and his heart pumped hard in his chest. He could hear the creature roar again and in a desperate motion he jumped behind some banyan trees. He sat down and wished he was invisible.

Then he noticed that Locke wasn't with him. He didn't dare to shout of fear that… that the monster or whatever it was would come.

The jungle was dark blue as the night had started to fall and the strange silence laid itself down once again. He couldn't hear the ticking noise anymore and he let himself breathe louder. He was shaking with fear.

"Locke?" he whispered, but the sound of his voice died out.

"Locke!" he said a little louder but didn't get a response. Slowly, he walked out from the trees. He looked around but all he could see was the endless trees and stones.

He screamed in shock as he turned around and saw Locke stand before him. Astonished he stared at him, he seemed unharmed. Boone started to stutter.

"Let's go to the black rock," Locke said and Boone and he without any questions followed him.

--

Flor looked over her shoulder. But then she continued to walk forward into the jungle. Another crack was heard and she spun around once again.

"Sean?" she asked, but as a bird flew over her head she relaxed and rubbed her eyes as she once again began to walk. She walked slower and slower until she stopped.

"Charlie I know you are there," she said and Charlie who had been hiding between a tree came out.

"What the hell are you doing?" she asked him and she looked more distressed than ever.

"I was following just like you followed me. I want my stash Florence!" Charlie roared and his eyes were even redder than hers, he looked like a corpse in the skin and small drops of sweat ran down his face.

"I burned it all!" she answered. "Charlie you need to stop!"

Charlie ran towards her but Flor was ready and when he struck out his hand she ducked and grabbed his legs. Charlie fell to the ground and Flor panted heavily on the ground.

"You are using!" Charlie shouted and tried to stand up but Florence held him down.

"I am not using! I burned it. I made a freaking fire and I burned it!" she screamed. He tried to wriggle himself out of her grip, but he was going through withdrawal and she was not. Suddenly the moon was hidden above them and they looked up at whatever was covering it.

"Uh… I didn't mean to interrupt you guys… but do you have any idea why I am covered in blood?"

Florence and Charlie stared at Brian who had appeared out of the forest.

--

"Rescue?" Wendy asked surprised with the news.

The man in the chair started to protest, but whatever he said was hushed by the tape.

"Shut up," Sawyer told the man. "We found this place quite easy, and nobody stopped us when we got in. We've checked all the rooms and Claire and Owen are nowhere to be seen. We only found this man here," he nodded to the chair. "This makes me wonder why Oliver Twist led you here."

Everyone turned to Karl, even the man in the chair.

"They," he pointed at the man. "They must have moved them; they knew I was going to help you! And he, he's our leader!"

Silence.

"How can we know to trust you?" Sayid asked. "Why did you trust him Wendy?"

Everyone's eyes turned to her and she tried to smile but failed as she felt the tension build up.

"I trust him because he told me there was an infiltrator in our camp."

"Yeah Ethan the nut job," Sawyer said.

"No," Wendy looked at all the anticipation surrounding her. "It's someone completely else…"

--

**Author's Notes: **Yay! Yes, I actually say yay of happiness over your reviews! Thank you guys! You are awesome!

The characters accepted won't be revealed just yet, but maybe you saw something in this chapter. I'm still hoping for some more males so I can accept more females. Please send in more! Even if you already have!  
I don't care if you have send me over five characters, I want more!

Thank you all again!

Namaste.


	11. Like Ghosts

_The bodiless airs, a wizard rout,  
Flit through thy chamber in and out,  
And wave the curtain canopy  
So fitfully- so fearfully-  
Above the closed and fringed lid  
'Neath which thy slumb'ring soul lies hid,  
That, o'er the floor and down the wall,  
_Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!

_- The Sleeper by Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 9, Like Ghosts**

--

"Zombie," Charlie told them. "It's a zombie."

"He, not an it you idiot," Flor spat and rubbed her sore arms, she looked oddly hostile against Charlie. "And zombies don't exist."

"And so doesn't dinosaurs, but I know what I saw in the jungle -"

"Could you guys keep it down?" Shannon whispered harshly to them. "I'm trying to hear what they're saying!"

Florence and Charlie had with great discomfort and fear taken a confused Brian with them to the beach. Jack's face of shock and the survivors staring and whispering hadn't made it easier for Brian. And now Jack, Sean and Lorraine had taken him into a tent to 'talk'. Everyone wondered what the hell had happened to him, first he was at the edge of death and in the next he was in the middle of the jungle – healed.

The problem with thief listening to their conversation was Dominic who had been set to guard around the tent, which he took with great responsibility. Nobody came even close, well except for Zidler and Margo, but they only heard a few words before Dom caught them.

Immediately at Shannon's words Dom started to sing loudly, so the words were now drowned in a very ugly song.

"This is torture!" Charlie said when he heard Dom's voice.

"Then you know how we feel," Flor said and glared at him before the survivors scattered, there were no use standing there now.

"I still think it's a zombie," Charlie told Allan.

--

"John… what happened out there?" Boone asked with a careful voice and quickened his pace so he walked side by side with Locke. The morning had come but Boone was still exhausted since he hadn't slept at all. Haunted by what had chased them before.

"What do you mean?" Locke asked.

"You know, when that thing or whatever it was started to chase us…"

"Did you see it?" Locke asked and actually smiled. Boone looked confused at him.

"No," he answered like the very idea was ridiculous.

"Well I did Boone, and it is not a thing."

"Then what is it?"

Locke stopped and met Boone's eyes and he tried to come up with the right word.

"It was the eye. The eye of the island and it was beautiful."

--

"Could you turn off the beep?" Sawyer spat and Sayid sighed.

"I do not think that's our priority right now," he answered and continued to examine the computer. "You can go and search through the other rooms while I do this," Sayid suggested when Sawyer continued to 'cough' and whisper swearwords underneath his breath.

Sawyer glared but left Sayid alone by the computer. Wendy, Bonnie and their two hostages had left to hide in the jungle until they were done.

"_4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42… we found the black… yes we know we can't go… it's too close…" _

Sayid didn't have much time to inspect it, or make sense of anything. But he realized that this computer was keeping track of something coming towards their island. That something was probably a ship, but he had an unnerving feeling about it. Bonnie, Wendy and Sawyer were all relieved that rescue was coming, but he knew something wasn't right.

"_Box… we'll be soon out of range for any transmissions… I miss you too…"_

The man, Henry Gale he called himself had protested and begged, said that it wasn't rescue at all, but they had overpowered with fury shut him up. Karl said that man was their leader. But what leader got himself caught so easily? Why was he here? Where were Ethan, Claire and Owen?

What would happen if the man was right?

--

"We should head back as soon as possible!" Wendy said stressed to Bonnie.

"We must search through the place more and Sayid really wants to examine that computer –"

"Yes but didn't you hear what I said earlier? We got an infiltrator in our camp right now! Who knows, everyone might be dead and gone when we come back! At least I could go and warn –"

"No!" Bonnie said harsh. "We're not splitting up again you hear me? I was freaking out with worry about you before and now when we got two hostages…" she casted a glance at the knocked out man and Karl. "We got to stick together."

"Karl says they might come here…"

"Sayid will be quick."

Wendy bit her lip and couldn't help but feel affection for Bonnie as she thought of the worry she had caused. She didn't know that the famous McQueen cared that much. It surprised her in a good way.

Wendy leaned against the tree. "Finally!" she shouted when Sayid and Sawyer climbed up from the door in the ground. Sawyer was now bearing another backpack.

"What's in that?" Bonnie asked and Sawyer smirked and held his hands up.

"Food!" he said and Wendy cheered.

"And helpful equipment, now let's move as fast as we can," Sayid had given his backpack to Bonnie and with great strength lifted the man over his shoulder.

"Uh… Sayid," Wendy said as they started to trek again. "I know you're pretty close to Superman… but not even you can carry such weight all the way back…"

"We'll build a stretcher at the next break. Right now have to hurry," Sayid said between clenched teeth. Wendy shrugged and motioned with her gun for Karl to go in front of her.

She hoped they would make it back in time.

--

Florence washed her dirty body in the water, still dressed in her clothes. They were filled with dirt from her fight with Charlie from the night before. She dipped her head underneath the water, the salt burned her skin but for the first time in a long time she felt free. Her worries got washed away by the sea and all she felt was peace. When the ruthless world hit her again when she breathed she remembered that there would never peace at this island. When she was done she hurried up to the beach again and walked over to the fruit stand.

"Huh," Zidler said when she took a mango.

"What?" Flor asked.

"You looked really sick yesterday," he said and pointed at her eyes.

"Guess I got better," she answered and took a bite; she smiled to show she wasn't going to snap at him again. "Sorry about before."

"It's okay," he answered and Flor knew it was. Suddenly a yell of happiness interrupted their moment and Margo rushed up to them. Flor looked curiously at the two things in her hands.

"I got the shovels!" Margo said cheerfully and held them up.

"What are you going to do?" Flor asked and wondered if she wanted to know the answer.

"We're going to listen to their conversation of course!" Margo rolled her eyes. "Let's go!" she dragged Zidler off with her.

Florence smiled when she watched them; she wished she could have a friend to always rely on. Kay was gone who knows where and Sean…

Well the way she had treated him wasn't exactly in the best friends forever manual.

"Florence?" she turned around and saw Charlie stand before her. He had his hands in his pockets and looked cautious at her. "Could we talk?"

----

Flor had screamed, swore, threatened to slice people's throats all to get the little boy in her arms. He felt too heavy even though he was so small and fragile. Her back hurt like hell, sweat dripped down her nose and she felt absolutely terrible. The little boy started to cry.

"Can someone take him now please?" she said in hurried and tired voice. She dumped him on the closest nurse and begged to get some water. In all that time she kept her eyes fixated on the door and waited. He would come; any second now he would dash into the room, smile and they would do like on one of those cheesy dramas and smile beautifully with their baby in their arms. Soon she would fall asleep and those cheesy scenes didn't have a passed out mom on the side. Would he just please come?

"Have you decided what to name him?" the nurse asked her and still stood by her side the baby in her arms.

"No and shush!" Flor glared and continued to stare at the door, perhaps she could with her mind powers make it open. Her son cried louder and it rang in her ears, she felt the stress rise and shouted:

"Would someone please shut him up!"

They called it post-birth depression, or something weird like that, apparently mothers had killed their children over it. She didn't want to kill her beautiful son, maybe just scream at him to shut up every time he cried. She felt worn out, her body looked different, she felt strange, she didn't feel like herself anymore. Byron also saw her in a different light after the birth. Like she had been hiding her true self underneath a beautiful mask. She never looked beautiful nowadays.

He didn't understand, he was angry with her, her son should be with someone who could take care of him, once he took little Jeremy and didn't tell her where they went, just came back the next morning like nothing happened.

Jeremy started to cry again. Flor closed her fist and hoped he would stop. She was too tired; she couldn't take care of him right now.

He didn't stop. Florence bit her lip hard and stood up and went slowly over to the cradle. Her son had his face twisted in tears but his blue eyes shone like no other. She looked down at her crying son and stroked his hair softly. She would never hurt him, she would never let Byron take him again, but would he please just stop crying!

----

The couple was dancing… no they weren't. It was dolls, no, a music box. And they didn't dance. They were frozen and unreal. An imitation of truth, that's what it was. Two people stuck in a music box…

"Who are you?" a hoarse voice asked and she blinked. The world was too blurry. She couldn't see.

"Listen to me!" someone grabbed her chin. "Who are you?"

"I…" she whispered and blinked several times before the harsh reality came storming at her. A woman with dark messy hair and an old worn out face stared at her.

"I'm Kaylee," she whispered. "I'm just Kaylee, a survivor from flight 815…"

She felt weak, her body numb. She could barely keep her eyes open and it hurt to hold up her head. A pain slashed through her throat each time she breathed.

"It hurts…" she whispered and a tear fell down her face and to her lips, it tasted like salt.

"Are you telling me the truth?"

"Yes," Kay whispered and tried to move her head out of the woman's grip. "Yes I am…"

"Tell me!" the woman demanded.

"I am a survivor… we're many… the beach… where's Dom?" she cried.

The woman sighed and released her grip. She walked over to the music box and stroked it before she turned her gaze to Kaylee.

"The electricity must have made you crazy," she said and sounded regretful.

"Where's Dom? Get me Dom!" Kay begged and the woman hushed her, wished she hadn't gone so hard on the girl before her, it had made her insane.

"I can help you see your mother…" she whispered and now Kaylee was looking at nothing, her head tilted to the side. "It will be a piece of cake, right Dom? Right…"

--

"So?" Dom asked when Sean, Jack and Lorraine came out.

"So what?" Sean asked him and gazed after Jack and Lorraine who were discussing something by the tent.

"So what's up with the living dead walking around?"

Sean frowned. "Honestly? I don't know. Jack's going mad, Lorraine's more sarcastic than ever and Brian has no idea what has been happening over the past few days."

"What? He doesn't remember?" Dom asked.

"Nope, Jack says amnesia is rare and is theorizing conspiracies already. But I think Brian is just as confused as us. He just woke up in the middle of the jungle healed."

"All right I can believe the 'amnesia' thing, but healed? Just like that?"

"Yeah I know it's crazy."

"So what are you going to do?" Dom asked.

"What can we do? He's okay, alive…"

"No memory, un-crushed leg…" Dom continued.

"Sean!" Jack shouted and Sean sighed.

"Don't tell anyone about this right?" he said and Dom nodded. Sean walked over to Jack and Lori.

Dom was quite proud of himself since he had managed to become a part of the A-team.

Margo and Zidler hurried to tell the survivors what they just heard…

----

Jeremy jumped into the big, brown puddle before she could stop him and suddenly she was covered from top to toe in dirty water.

"Damn," she swore.

"Damn!" Jeremy yelled with joy and Flor cursed silently for herself, not only did she look like a zombie but now her son would tell everyone damn. Then everyone would give the 'you're too young to be a mother' look. And then Byron would give her the 'I should be raising this child alone look'.

"All right you little pirate," Flor said and tried to sound cheerful as she lifted her son up in her arms. "What do you say when I say you can go in and roll on daddy's side of the bed with that mud on you?"

"Yippee!" Jeremy cheered and together they ran back to their apartment. Jeremy ran straight to their room and she could hear he was having fun. Flor took off her coat and her shoes, even though she was probably a living bacteria mother ship she threw herself down on their couch and put her head in her hands.

She and Byron had another of their fights the night before. One of those when it included Florence being an irresponsible mother. But Florence didn't know what to do, all she wanted to was to keep her son safe, happy, to let him grow up and not hate her for raising him wrong.

When she told Byron that - he said that she didn't use to feel that way.

She hated it, it made her feel weak. She just wished things, it sounded cliché, but she wished things could go back to what they were before. With Jeremy of course, she couldn't live without his stubborn nature and innocent smile.

"Hello…"

Flor looked up and saw Byron stand by the door, suitcase in his hand.

"Hey," she whispered and dried away her tears.

"Are you crying?"

"No,"

"It's okay if you are," he took off his shoes and walked over to her. Then he sat down by her side.

"Sorry about yesterday," he said gentle and stroke her hair. "I was just angry; I didn't mean anything I said…"

Flor didn't say anything. She felt all her anger just wash off her and she couldn't bring herself to snap back. Instead she gave him a faint smile.

"I love you flower," he said and looked her in the eyes. Flor put her head against his shoulder and put her hand into his. This was before, this was good and this was what she wanted.

"Flor," Byron said after a while.

"Yeah?"

"No offense but you smell weird."

Florence laughed.

----

"No memory?"

"Amnesia?"

"Not Zombie?"

Margo nodded eagerly and she and Zidler shone in the attention they got. Charlie and Flor who had been talking in the jungle rushed toward the ring of survivors that had formed.

"What's going on?" Flor asked, she looked upset but tried to hide it behind a smile.

"Brian got amnesia," Claret said and looked scared.

"What do you mean amnesia?" Charlie asked.

"Amnesia is when you lose your memory," Allan said.

"I know what amnesia is!" Charlie answered offended.

"Do you think he's lying?" Florence interrupted everyone and the survivors became silent at the thought.

"Why would he lie?" Sun asked her eyes wide.

"I don't know Sun, but the story does sound wishy-washy to me," Hurley said and some nodded in agreement.

"I think Lorraine and Jack will figure it out," Shannon put in. "They'll know."

But Jack and Lorraine, who were arguing and asking questions had no more idea than anyone of them.

The sounds of the wonders, words and questions seemed to fade away and Fox felt the panic buildup inside his chest. Allan and Claret glanced at him out of the corners of their eyes, and he knew they just waited for the moment. He swallowed.

"So what do you think happened?" Zidler asked and Fox jumped. Zidler laughed at his nervousness.

"I… I don't know." Fox lied. Because he knew everything.

--

"Wow," Boone uttered and looked at the ravine on their left. With every step they took on the narrow path beside it small rocks fell down to the forest underneath. Boone had never had a fear of heights but now he started to feel scared, what would happen if he'd fall? Still he couldn't help but admire the beauty of the world that was laid out beneath them. He had never really understood how huge the island was. Of what could be hidden in the land.

"Careful Boone," Locke said when he almost slipped and with relief they reached straight ground again at the forest. "We're close!" Locke said and smiled when he looked at the map. Boone nodded; he was tired and just wished they would get to the black rock as soon as possible.

When they had trekked for a while Boone halted and stared.

"Is that an anchor?" he asked, not believing what he was seeing. Locke's eyes widened at surprise and they both started to run along the chain. And what they saw at the end was bigger than anything they could have imagined.

"A ship," Boone said, now in more disbelief than ever. "A ship, in the middle of the jungle…"

Locke read on the ship. "The black rock."

"This is no ordinary island is it?" Boone asked and stared upon the old ship in awe. It was covered with green vines, planks had fallen off the ship's walls, it was dirty and old. But still you could see what it had looked in its former pride. The black rock it read with large letter on the ship, its name.

"No," Locke smiled now brighter and started to walk towards a hole in the ship's wall. "No it isn't."

"Do you think Owen and Claire are there?" Boone asked and followed him.

"I do not know."

"How, how did it get here – in the middle of the jungle?"

"I don't know," Locke answered and climbed into the ship. Boone was still in shock and excitement started to rush through his veins and he also climbed in.

It was dark and Locke turned on his flashlight. There were boxes all over the whole floor, and Boone looked terrified at the corpses still chained to the ship.

"Slaves," Locke said simply and nodded to the skeletons. "I would say the transported slaves here."

Boone swallowed and they started to make their way across the floor.

"Look after anything that could help us with the hatch, or with finding Owen and Claire," Locke said and walked towards one of the skeletons.

Boone took out his own flashlight and lightened up a skeleton sitting, he wondered if the person had starved to death, trapped in the ship.

"Locke!" he shouted and Locke hit his head when he rushed over to Boone.

"What is it?" he asked.

"Dynamite," Boone said and pointed to a box named explosives. Without a word Locke opened it carefully.

"Dynamite," Locke agreed. "Boone I just think you found a way for us to open the hatch!" Locke reached down to pick the dynamite up but Boone stopped him.

"We should explore this ship more before we start packing hundred-year old dynamite into our backpacks. I've read about this stuff, the older it gets the bigger boom."

Locke nodded in agreement and they walked up to the stairs that lead to the top of the ship. It was covered with broken furniture and even more boxes; none labeled explosives to their luck though.

Locke sighed and took off his backpack.

"This is going to take some work."

--

"Drink," the woman said and out the bottle to Kay's lips, she opened her mouth and drank. And with every gulp she felt better.

"Thank you," Kay whispered and opened her eyes. "Thank you Kate."

"I'm not Kate," the woman answered and leaned against the wall.

"And I'm not Kaylee," Kay said and smiled.

"How long have you been here?" the woman asked.

"A long time," Kay whispered. "Almost a month… huh, I wonder if Claire's going to have her baby. She was eight months in… wasn't she Kate?"

"Baby?"

"She's pregnant. But now she's gone, she and the baby gone, gone, and gone. Do you know where she is Kate?"

"I repeat; I'm not Kate."

"Who… who are you then?" Kaylee asked and tried to lift her hand, but it was tied to the chair. Kay looked to the left and saw some clothes hanging.

"Rousseau," she read out loud.

"How did you know my name?"

"I…" Kay still couldn't lift her hand. "I read it, there…"

Rousseau followed her gaze.

"I believe you," she said. "I believe you're not one of them."

"One of who?" Kay asked.

"The other people on this island, the people who took my Alex."

"I wish they could take me" Kaylee whispered and closed her eyes, drifting off again. "I wish they would."

--

"Jin!" Sun said tearful as he ignored her. "Please, just listen to me!" she tried to grab his arm but he shrugged her off without even looking at her.

"Jin, please you must understand…" she begged in Korean but Jin hurried the fastest he could over to the raft and left her behind. Sun stood in the sand and tears fell down her face, she had never felt this lost.

"Don't worry."

Sun looked to the side where Rosalie was sitting underneath the shadow of a palm tree, with a book in her hand.

"He still loves you," Rosalie said. "But he just needs some time away to think of things. He's angry but soon he will start to think of what's important to him. And we both know what that is… you."

Sun hoped that Rosalie was right and sat down beside her, she looked at the book but the words said nothing to her.

"I betrayed him," Sun said after a while of silence. "He will never come back."

"I am not saying I'm an expert on relationships, believe me I'm not. But I do know when two people care for each other," Rosalie said and put the book away. "I know that Sawyer cares a lot more about Bonnie than he says, that Kaylee always looks at Dominic in a different way, that Jack always takes care of Lori… and that you and Jin love each other."

Sun buried her bare feet underneath the sand and took a deep breath.

"When I was a little girl, I used to think that when I found the man I loved… we would be happy, forever."

Rosalie took Sun's hand and squeezed it.

"You know, I don't really like when some people say everything's going to be okay, because I know they're lying. I don't lie and Sun, for you and Jin… things will be okay."

Sun smiled, her black hair fell in her face when she turned to Rosalie. "Thank you."

"Guys!" Shannon ran towards them and interrupted the moment. "Jack and the others is gathering us up for a meeting, come!" she and Sun helped Rosalie and they started to make their way towards the other survivors.

--

Jack looked at the people gathered around him. They were excited, curious, humans fed on mystery and suspense. Sean nodded to him to start.

He took a deep breath. "I'm sure you are all wondering what happened to Brian. He was hurt badly in an accident and then he disappeared and came back without a scratch on him."

"I still think zombie," Charlie whispered and Shannon hushed him.

"The truth is we don't know what happened to him. I wish I could say he was recovering and walked away on his own – but Brian was dying, there's no way to explain what happened."

"What does Brian say?" Florence asked.

"He says… he doesn't remember."

"We knew that!" Margo and Zidler said in unison.

The survivors scattered again, began to do their normal chores of the day. Sean went over help with the raft, Zidler and Margo skipped off to whatever new prank they had going, Rosalie and Shannon started to make dinner and Jack gazed over to Lorraine and Brian. Lorraine was giving anyone who even dared to come close to Brian the evil eye.

He had an uneasy feeling of what Locke would have said if he was at the camp.

Destiny, it was destiny who healed Brian.

But Jack of course didn't believe in destiny.

--

"Fox!" Claret shouted and rushed up to him by the waterline.

Fox wondered if he would have heart-attack as Claret continued to speak:

"We need to talk."

Fox looked around to see if there were any witnesses to his on-coming death, but the camp was too far away.

"About - about what?" he asked swallowed down the lump in his throat.

"You know about what."

It was an unspoken rule; he wasn't supposed to talk with her. But most importantly – she wasn't supposed to know about him. Still there she was, her blue eyes stared intently at him and he nodded slightly to acknowledge her words.

"You are not supposed to be here anymore," she said and Fox didn't get surprised but fear started to eat him.

"I know," Fox whispered and tried to hold back the tears.

"I am going to tell them," Claret said and Fox nodded and looked away. "I'm sorry but I have to tell them, when he comes I will have no other choice."

Fox wished he had.

--

"I'm going to tell everyone you caught my flu," Flor said and gave Charlie another water bottle.

"Thanks," Charlie answered shyly and put it in his red backpack. Flor tried to smile and nodded. "So," Charlie said and put the backpack over his shoulders. "I guess I owe you an apology."

"Yeah," Flor answered and looked down.

"Uh, thought I'd give this back to you," he held out the ring and Flor stared at it like she had never seen a ring before. She blinked and took it and closed her hand.

"I'm sorry I didn't believe you when you said you burned it, it's just… the withdrawal…"

"Just go you moron," Flor said and actually managed to smile. Charlie nodded thanks before he left into the jungle. She looked after him, hoping that he would get better, that she would too.

"Where was he going?" Kate asked and Flor turned around and saw her standing behind her. Kate had her hands in her pockets and she looked unusually weary.

"He got the flu and decided to go over to the caves until it was over," Flor said quickly and avoided eye contact.

"The same flu you had?" Kate asked. "I noticed you looked really bad the other day." Flor nodded and something about the way Kate acted made her suspicious, but she shrugged it off when she saw Kate's eyes.

"Everyone's just leaving every day it seems," Kate said and Florence knew she was talking about Kaylee. "I just wish they would come back."

"They'll come back," Flor said but her voice was shivering, she bit her lip and Kate left. Flor thought of the happenings since the crash, her emotions, how she had acted.

She just missed him so much.

--

"Mommy?"

Florence put her book away and leaned forward and met her son's eyes.

"What is it sweetie?" she asked and he crawled up to her in the bed. She put an arm around him and stroked his hair. Jeremy sighed and said in a dramatic voice:

"I can't tell you."

"You can tell me anything," Flor said and turned his face up. "You hear that kiddo."

"Why aren't you and Daddy married?" Jeremy blurted out and his blue eyes looked worried into hers.

"Oh…" Florence was surprised by the question and she started to finger on her ring.

"Don't you love each other?" he asked.

"We love each other very much."

"Then why aren't you married?"

"We are not married yet. We just don't really have the time for it now," Florence explained, but those words seemed faint in her ears. "We're engaged instead, a promise that we're going to be married."

"So you can just leave?" Jeremy asked and he looked afraid at the thought, he took her hand. "Please don't leave mommy."

Flor stared at him surprised, her son was honestly terrified. She embraced him and held him close.

"I'm never going to leave. I will never ever leave you. Why would you think that?"

"Daddy said you could."

Florence felt as if she'd been hit by a bus. Her face fell and shocked she hugged him closer.

"Well I'm never going to. I'm going to glue myself to you if that's what it takes, and don't think you can skip off to college later and run out on me, I'll walk on water to get to you."

--

Jin was ignoring any tries to conversation, even though he didn't know English they had somehow managed to sort of communicate before. Sean watched as Jin hammered on the planks like they were his mortal enemies.

"Problems with women huh? Yeah I got girl problems too," Sean told Jin who had no idea what he was saying. "I guess you and Sun fight over her knowing English. I wish my problem was that. You're lucky."

Jin didn't know what to say and just continued to hammer.

"You see, I like this girl. I didn't at first, she was too happy and way too chatty," Sean frowned "I wish she was happy now. So she was quite annoying, but then I deiced to give her a chance because… well, I don't really know. And she's nice and it's cool."

"Cool?" Jin repeated without knowing what he said.

"Yeah, and then she turns different. Suddenly it turns out she got loads of baggage and a like for running away from people without a word. So I wonder why I still care. She was annoying and she's still annoying. Was Sun like that to you too before? All happy at first and then moody at next," Sean stopped binding the banyan trees together. "Do you think I should try to talk with her? Maybe I should try to be there for her, no that's not really a good thing to do. Then I'll end up in the girlfriend chart. I do sound like a girl."

He turned to Jin. "Don't tell anyone I said that!"

Jin muttered idiot in Korean.

--

They had finally dug their way through so they could climb up to the ship's upper part. The sudden change from darkness to light hurt Boone's eyes and he blinked. The sun blazed above them and Boone turned to gaze over the ship.

Here there were no bodies and he and Locke walked over the ship. Locke bent down and took up some notes that were scattered on the floor and Boone walked over to the middle. There was some kind of table around the main mast, on it were some dynamite and next to it a compass.

"Huh," he said and picked it up. It didn't point north. He turned it around and saw some engraving at the back.

"What is it?" Boone turned around and saw Locke stand before him.

"It's a compass," he said. "It says D A on it. What does D A even mean? Is it French or something?"

"Maybe it's not a word. I think it's someone's initials. And by the looks of it, that name has been put on that compass recently, while the compass itself looks to be as old as this ship."

"That's strange."

"Indeed it is."

--

She couldn't walk on water.

Florence dipped her feet into the sea and watched the waves. She couldn't step out on it, she would sink. No matter what she had said to her son she couldn't walk on water, she couldn't find a way to save him. She gazed over to the raft where Sean and Jin were working. If she could just get on it…

She rushed up to the beach. Her feet covered by sand and her hair tangled in it. She halted when she came up behind Sean.

"You know what?"

Sean put away the hammer and looked up at Flor, she was smiling and he couldn't help but smile back.

"What?" he asked.

"I've had an epiphany," she chirped and put her hands on her hips.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah."

"So… what was the epiphany about?" he asked.

"Well you know," she nodded slowly and he noticed how she looked a lot healthier now. "About everything and I feel a lot… better."

"That's great."

She nodded and they stood silent for a moment. Sean thought of what to say when she suddenly dashed forward and kissed him on the cheek. He didn't have time to react as she just beamed and then rushed away back to the camp. He gazed after her.

Florence still had a knack of running away.

--

"Dude, do you have the ability not to grin like an idiot?" Hurley asked him when they later sat by the fire. Sean didn't answer but just continued to smile and Hurley muttered something about fools.

Jin and Sun came over to them and Jin offered them a fish that Hurley happily accepted. Sean noticed that they were holding hands and how they glanced at each other lovingly. He guessed Sun and Jin had come to terms with each other again. Kind of like him and Flor.

"And now he's smiling like a love fool again," Hurley said and shook his head. "Dude, you look crazy."

"I'm just very happy," he said.

"Which island are you on?" Dom asked between his bites as he walked by over to Margo and Zidler. He sat down uninvited beside them and Zidler stared at him as he ate his mango. After what seemed like minutes of silence Dom said:

"What's up?" and blinked at Margo, she giggled and Zidler looked irritated.

"We're theorizing," Margo said carefully.

"You mean about Brian?" Dom looked at Zidler who nodded.

"Yeah, we wonder how he could heal himself."

"Maybe he's a robot," Dom joked.

"Or maybe he's like a vampire, those can heal themselves right?" Zidler said very serious.

"Like ghosts!" Margo said and Dom frowned.

"Ghosts can't heal themselves," he said. "Haven't you seen any movies?"

"They can't get hurt."

"Because they're already dead!" Zidler said and actually agreed with Dom.

"I know I'm right," Margo said and pouted.

"I know you're crazy," Dom declared and Zidler spent the next five minutes trying to cheer Margo up, telling her she was only a little crazy.

Brian was sitting alone by his new built tent, the survivors looked at him out of the corners of their eyes and he knew they all thought he was a liar. Or like Lorraine, that he was a clone or terminator.

He sighed and took another sip of the water.

"Mi – mind if I sit – sit down?" Brian looked up and saw a nervous Fox in front of him.

"It's a free island."

Fox sat down on the sand and looked uncomfortable. Brian decided to help the guy out.

"I woke up in the jungle covered in blood and I have no memory of the past few days."

"What?" Fox asked.

"That's why you are here right? To hear my story."

Fox shook his head. "I already know what – what happened."

"All right then."

Brian wished there were some beer.

"You got to get rid of that stutter man," he told Fox after a moment of silence. "Nobody takes a stuttering guy serious."

"I – I ca - can't help it."

"Of course you can, just stop being so damn afraid all the time!" Brian said.

"Are – aren't you afraid?"

"Nope," and Brian realized that it was true. He wasn't scared, worried more perhaps. But that was not about him, but of someone else.

"Does the," he tried to sound casual. "Does the search for Claire go well? I mean for Claire and Owen."

Fox looked sadly down and he didn't have to answer, Brian understood.

Across the island, by a large tree, Bonnie and Sawyer sat together. Sayid, Karl and that Henry Gale man sat by the fire a bit away but Bonnie liked to be away from them, just her alone… and Sawyer of course.

"So what do you make of it all? The Karl guy and the supposed rescue?" Sawyer asked.

"No," Bonnie said.

"What?"

"No, let's talk about something else," she was laying on her back on the ground and stared up at the branches. Sawyer watched her.

"Like what?" he asked.

"Everything," she answered.

Wendy sat by the fire. Sayid was awake. Wendy doubted that he would sleep at all with their hostage 'Henry Gale' there. Karl had also his hands tied together and Wendy looked worried at his bandage. She grabbed one of the backpacks and picked up new ones, Karl took off his shirt and she, without a word changed the bandage carefully. He smiled and Sayid raised his eyebrows.

"Thanks," Karl said.

Rosalie sat with Shannon by her new sleeping place at the beach. Shannon's tent was only a few feet away. They were eating some orange fruit (that looked like pears… but tasted like chicken) and talked. Well Rosalie was trying to discuss politics and Shannon was trying to discuss the difference between onyx mascara and coal. Suddenly Rosalie leaned forward to take another fruit when Shannon gasped.

"What?" she asked and looked at her.

"Your leg… it just moved."

Rosalie looked down at her legs and tried to move them. It worked. She screamed and dropped the fruit in the sand. Shannon yelled happily too.

By a large ship in the middle of the jungle Boone and Locke carried their backpacks with explosives, they were careful not to run or make any sudden movements. Locke was holding the notebook in his hand and Boone held the compass.

When the sun disappeared behind the trees Locke suddenly crashed down on the ground. Boone shouted and took off his backpack before he ran over to Locke.

"I… I can't…" Locke gazed down at his legs. They weren't moving. Boone tried to help him stand up but Locke's legs budged under him.

"I can't move my legs," Locke breathed.

--

"Here," the man said, his dark eyes staring forward at the sun going down behind the hovels of houses on the road. A wind wisped up the leaves in the air, the dirt and an empty beer can rolled down closer to the water. There was a bitter scent of salt and smoke in the air and she shuddered in the cold wind.

The woman took the photographs and the man left without a word. She sighed and sat down on the worn out park bench. She glanced down at the pictures. The two first were of two men, identical at the first look. But when she searched them closer she could see small differences in eye colors. She took up the third photo, it was of two women, the picture was blurry and she read the note plastered to it. She took up the last picture, a man; he was a round thirty with brown eyes and lighter brown hair. He wasn't smiling and he wasn't even looking at the camera.

He was the one they were going to kill.

--

**Author's Notes:** I wanted some fluff.

Because then all the horrible things that will happen later feels worse/less worse.

Namaste.


	12. Haunted

By a route obscure and lonely,  
Haunted by ill angels only,  
_  
Where an Eidolon, named night,  
On a black throne reigns upright,  
I have wandered home but newly  
From this ultimate dim Thule._

_- Dream-Land by Edgar Allan Poe_

**--**

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 10, Haunted**

--

Fox gazed over the ocean, the waves crashed into the rocks and up to the beach. Ruthlessly it did so, again and again. It never got tired of it. He drifted off in thought, the air was not warm yet and he was in a daze.

He thought of what Claret had said, what she was going to do. He thought of Ethan, what he said he was going to do. He had done it, Claret confirmed it, she didn't even have to say it, he knew. Everyone was going to do something to destroy him. But that was the price you paid when you disobeyed orders. You didn't get punished in public, not by Ben. It was sneaky, manipulative, more harsh and cruel than any sentence imaginable.

He smelled smoke from the burned out fires. Saw the survivors wake up from the night. Some terrified, some determined, all of them yearning to go home. But someone wouldn't let them; still they tried and ignored the truth that was right in front of them.

The raft, he knew what he was supposed to do. But he had made his decision, he was never going to light a match and throw it on it. He was not going to watch the flames swallow the survivors hope. He was going to do something right, something good.

Even though it was not going to succeed.

--

He played mind games.

In the little time Wendy fell asleep and Sayid turned his back to them, Henry Gale had scared Karl to silence. The before helpful boy had turned into stone. No one couldn't get a word out of him. And even though the man had not said any words, Sayid knew that this man was a threat. The way his eyes turned, the way he looked at them as he knew exactly what they were going to do next – to Sayid, he seemed like the man that would lead people like them, kidnappers and probably worse. Karl had promised them he would tell them everything, but everything seemed small now, they still didn't know where and Claire and Owen were, what these people wanted, of course they knew about the infiltrator and who it was, but wasn't it strange that of all the people… Sayid sighed tom himself, he had never guessed, not even thought the thought.

He glanced at Wendy who had a spiteful look on her face; she looked tired, more tired than any of them and madder. She was angry with herself for letting the man and Karl be alone, to make Karl so cold and frightened.

Still, they had heard no words. No words of threat, still that man had done something. It was obvious.

Bonnie walked in the front and Sawyer in the back, gun pointed at Henry Gale's back. Still they managed to cast glances at each other, smiling like they had a secret nobody knew. Henry would from time to time try to say something, but was muted by the tape still over his mouth. Sayid wanted to interrogate him, but he had to be patient. There would be time for that when they were at the camp, not now in the middle of the jungle.

Suddenly the everlasting rain stopped falling. Sayid noticed it and stopped; Wendy walked right into him and swore. They gazed up. There, above the branches was a big smiley face, so misplaced that they didn't believe what they saw.

"Balloon," Bonnie said after a while in disbelief. They all stared up at it; Bonnie looked down and noticed what was next to her. She shrieked and took a step back. It was a cross, a grave. Somebody was buried underneath their feet.

Wendy had her mouth open but closed it quickly. She looked absolutely furious, but most of all terrified.

"What kind of island is this?"

A small whisper. Karl stared down at the ground. Sawyer glared. Bonnie bit her lip. Sayid didn't know what to do and the man, Henry Gale smiled with his eyes.

--

Shannon stared at Rosalie, Rosalie pretended not to notice and continued to fold the clothes, Shannon still stared at Rosalie, Rosalie continued to pretend she didn't notice, Shannon stared harder at Rosalie. Rosalie sighed.

"Shannon just say it!" she was tired and irritated. Her hair was pulled back and even though it had just been raining she was sweating of the heat.

"Why did it go away?" Shannon asked and took Rosalie's wrist so she stopped folding the clothes.

"I don't know Shan," Rosalie answered. Shannon let go of her and leaned back. The rain had stopped and had been exchanged by a blazing sun. Shannon looked away, she didn't want to meet Rosalie's eyes.

"Do you think you wanted it to go away?"

Rosalie swung around and glared, suddenly she was furious, like a switch had been turned.

"How dare you!"

But Shannon didn't seem ashamed or afraid; she just looked at Rosalie sadly. Like she had just realized something.

"My brother is better at this psychology stuff," she looked down."But I think there's something like, when people who are paralyzed can continue to be that because they don't want to get better, even … though they could."

Rosalie breathed heavily and just shook her head.

"I can't believe you just said that."

"Rosie…"

"Go!" Rosalie spat and Shannon stood up, she lingered on the spot but then she walked away and left Rosalie alone. She looked down at the clothes she had folded and threw them in the way of a surprised Zidler who quickly ran off towards Margo.

Rosalie tried to stop the tears, but she was too frustrated and they fell freely. She tried to blink them back; she knew Shannon still kept her gaze at her. She hated it. She didn't want someone to examine her like that. Think they knew something about her that she didn't know, think she was a nutcase. Sawyer, she missed Sawyer, it was times like these she needed him. He wouldn't have said that, he would understand. He had known them, her daughter and Lita. He had hugged them both, seen that they were good, that they were happy, knew that they had lived and breathed the air around them.

"Here," Rosalie had buried her head in her arms and she gazed up through her tears. Fox stood before her and he held the clothes in his arms. "I… I ca – can help you fo – fold them."

Rosalie didn't answer. She sniveled and dried away her tears. Fox sat down with her, she knew he had something on his mind, his look said that. But she herself had a lot to think about and kept her mouth close. But when they were done she smiled, and he knew it was of gratitude.

--

Poison Jin.

That had been Kate's idea, even Zidler's idea had been better.

Florence had volunteered to go get the water for the day and to her delight Sean joined her, said he needed a break from working on the raft. Apparently Michael and Jin's arguments had gotten on his nerves too much, but still the raft was almost finished and Michael's smile grew bigger each day.

"So what do you think I should do?" Flor asked.

"Poison Michael," Sean said quickly and Florence rolled her eyes and jumped over a rock on the ground.

"Of course, any ideas where I could get the poison?" she joked. "And if anyone should get poisoned it should be Lorraine. She's not even working on the raft."

"Sawyer's gone, you could raid his stash," Sean said dead serious. "Then we could slip it into Michael's water and hope Jin doesn't drink it."

He laughed to show he wasn't serious and Florence smiled, still she couldn't get rid of that nervous feeling that the clock was ticking, which it wasn't since she had broken it in the plane crash, but still the raft would be done every day now and she needed to be on it. She had to.

"Maybe Jin will stay," she whispered. "Because of Sun I mean…"

"No, he's going on it," Sean answered.

"How can you be sure?"

"Because he wants to save his wife."

"And Michael wants to save his son… I guess that leaves Lori. It's going to be a piece of cake to convince her to give up her place…"

They both thought of what Lorraine would do if Flor asked her, probably laugh in her face.

"There's not really another option," Sean said and Flor knew it was true. Or they just had bad imagination.

It was a bittersweet feeling talking with Sean. She didn't know if she was happy that they talked like normal, like her days of being angry and bitter never happened. But they had, just not that much for Sean. He really didn't know her that well even though she wanted him too. He didn't know that she had a big bruise on her left arm and that was why she wore a sweater instead of a t-shirt, he didn't know that she and Charlie had a fight in the jungle and that was how she had gotten it, he didn't know that the reason for the fight was the hidden drugs at a rock that she often visited.

At the thought of the hidden stash Flor felt a lump form in her throat, the guilt ate her and she didn't know why.

She really needed to be on that raft.

--

"I need you to give me the king of hearts."

"Margo, that's not how you play."

"Well how do you play poker?" she asked and Zidler stared at her in disbelief. Margo looked up and saw his wide eyes.

"What?" she took up another card.

"While Monty here is out I can teach you how to play strip poker," Dom said and sat down with them. He ignored Zidler's utter shock. "It's really easy all you have to do is…"

"Yeah?" Margo asked when Dom's voice trailed off. He was looking to his left where Allan was opening a suitcase.

"Dom? Hello? Have you been haunted by a ghost or what?" Margo asked. Dom ignored her and he put the cards down. Margo asked him again if he was okay and he mumbled some excuse before he got up and ran over to Allan.

"Hi Dom," Allan said a bit surprised when Dom appeared beside him.

"Where'd you find that?" Dom pointed at the suitcase.

"Oh, right, I think Jack found this. Must have belonged to that marshal, there were five guns in it but those on the search for Claire and Owen got one each and I think Sean got the fifth one," Allan held up some papers. "Nobody has really searched it through –"

"I'll do that," Dom grabbed the photograph and papers from his hand. Allan looked taken aback and Dom smiled to show everything was fine, but it was a forced one and he took a harder grip around the documents.

"I can look them through… right… I'll take this also? Awesome," Dom took the suitcase too and stood up and hurried away. Allan looked baffled after him for a few seconds before he came to his senses again.

"Al," once again someone appeared next to him and he saw Claret. She was holding some washed clothes in her hands. Allan stood up and helped her hang them up.

"I got to do something soon," Claret said after a while and he knew that this was serious.

"For him?"

"Yes," Claret hanged up a white t-shirt. "You know about Fox right?"

Allan nodded and glanced at Fox who to his surprise was talking with Brian of all people.

"I really don't want to do it," she whispered. "But I am going to."

"I'll back you up," Allan said. He saw that Fox gave a nervous laugh from distant.

"Thanks."

----

Fox knew. He always knew. The children knew that, some teased him, some admired him and some used him. The teachers were intimidated, angry and anxious that he was going to raise his hand too soon, correct them, remind them that he knew more than them. They couldn't have that. They lied and said he was wrong. They knew it wasn't true, the children knew it.

Fox knew.

It was in gym they could do it. There the teacher was better than him, the children knew more than him. He didn't know if that was a relief or not.

"Run faster Edwards!" the boys screamed, he couldn't. His legs burned and he couldn't see. The sweat had run down to his eyes and made everything blurry. He tripped and fell.

"It's good you can't fall in this class," the teachers started to say when he got something right. To show him they were superior.

Just like his dad did when he came home.

He came home slightly limping. His head was swirling, and the world with it. When he came in through the door his mother didn't say anything when she saw him. She just measured his form over her eye and walked into the kitchen. He took off his backpack carefully; it felt like the world was spinning underneath his feet.

Fox sat down in the chair and his mom handed him a plate with some mysterious green things. He didn't complain. It tasted good even though it burned his tongue. His mother still didn't acknowledge the fact that he rushed half-way into the meal to the bathroom to throw up. She took away the plate when he was finished and sighed.

"Your father will come home earlier from work today." Scared. Fox is old enough to know that it meant his father had lost another job.

He went to his bed, turned off all the lights. The darkness felt good and he could almost relax. It was cold. It hurt less when it was cold. But he froze. He leaned his head back against pillow. His bruises burned.

Matthew, his older brother came in after a while.

"I'm sorry," he whispered and Fox was glad he wasn't angry. Matt knew what happened; they went to the same school. He sat beside him on the bed, held out a bucket. "Dad's home."

Fox threw up in it. Matt expected it. He knew his little brother better than anyone.

Matt closed Fox's eyes and told him to be quiet. Fox tried to not breathe when he heard his father open the door.

"Fox!" he yelled. Fox could smell the alcohol from his bed. He heard that Matt walks over to his dad. He heard the small whine when his father grabbed his brother and pushed him out of the room.

Fox whimpered when he heard the punches. He tried to bury his head in his pillow; he tried to block it all out. He didn't want to listen. He didn't want to know.

----

Dominic sat down by the edge of the forest. He leaned back against a tree and put the suitcase next to him. The photograph was in his hand.

It was a boy, green eyes so similar to his, light brown hair and a smile that was probably forced when he was supposed to pose for the picture. It was the eyes that were true, annoyed with having to sit still, slightly looking out of the camera to the window, wishing he could be outside.

Dom put the photo in his pocket. He grabbed the suitcase and went into the jungle. Not too far in, just enough so he would be covered by the trees.

He put down the documents, the documents of them. He, Kate and Kaylee, the fact that they were all wanted for murder.

Dom took out lighter and with a moment of hesitation he lighted the documents on fire. The flames weren't that big and it was a bright day, he wasn't worried about the smoke or that the leaves would get caught on fire. All he was worried about was that all the evidence was erased. So that they could be safe.

They: he, Kate and Kaylee.

What he didn't know was that someone already knew about them.

--

"Was it true?"

"What do you mean Boone?" Locke asked, they walked the slowest they could through the green jungle. Even though they didn't run they were both sweating from the heat of the sun – and the dynamite on their back's.

"Was it true what Brian said before about you being paralyzed?" Boone looked at Locke. "Because of what happened earlier at the black rock –"

"I just fell, that's all there is to it," Locke said.

"You couldn't move your legs!"

Locke turned to Boone and they stopped walking.

"I can walk now. That's all that's important," he started to walk again.

"But –"

"Boone I would appreciate if we could stop talking about it."

Boone made a grimace but closed his mouth. He started to finger with the compass again and whispered D A to himself. It pointed west. He decided to break Locke's no talking rule.

"It's just so strange," he said and was encouraged when Locke turned to look at the compass, he smiled.

"Not as strange as this," Locke said and held up a book. "This is completely in Latin, Via Domus, and the drawing in this…" he opened up a page in the book and Boone looked down at the drawings. Strange symbols.

"Maybe that Fox guy could understand this. He's kind of a genius," Boone said and Locke nodded in agreement.

"Yes maybe he could."

"What's that?" Boone pointed at one of the notes. "What's the… swan?"

--

"Kate."

She looked up and saw her brother before her, he looked uncomfortable but determined.

"We got to find Kaylee," he said and she smiled in surprise.

"What changed your mind?" she asked and Dominic swallowed. He didn't really want to tell her.

"Kay's all alone in freaking Jurassic Park! We got to help her and drag her back here."

"Okay, okay," Kate said, she wasn't going to bring up the other conversation the other day when Dom had been obstinate on not going after Kaylee, he looked upset. In a different way than before.

"I'll get Sean's gun," he said. "You can get the food and other stuff… and don't forget the blankets like last time."

He wandered away to search after Sean. Kate smiled faintly; they were going to be reunited again.

--

"How did you get here?" Kay asked when she had drunk almost all of the water. Some of it ran down her neck as she had greedily wanted to swallow everything immediately.

"I and my science team shipwrecked here on this Island sixteen years ago."

"Where are they now?" she asked and closed her eyes, still so awfully tired.

"They are dead. The sickness killed them all."

"You're not sick Kate…"

Rousseau didn't even bother to correct Kaylee. The girl had gone mad. There was no point in trying to make her good again. She grabbed her rifle from the wall, it was time to hunt. But when she took one step up the ladder a thought crossed her mind. She looked over her shoulder at the girl sitting, tied to the chair.

What if she had the sickness?

Rousseau hesitated but decided to deal with it when she came back. She climbed up, pushed herself out into the jungle and left Kaylee alone.

"Kay, hey Evans, wake up!"

"Dom?" Kay asked.

"The one and only one. The crazy French chick's gone now; you got to get out while you have the chance!"

Kaylee opened her eyes, but she couldn't see Dom anywhere in the room. The world wasn't blurry like before and she could now determine where she was, how she was tied to the chair, and how far away the closest knife was. She smirked.

--

"Charlie?" Flor shouted and her voice echoed in the cave.

"How weird it is here," Sean said. "Now when it's so empty…"

Flor nodded and Sean started to fill the bottles with water. She walked into another cave but she didn't see Charlie there either. She began to worry and rushed to the left part of the caves, there was nobody there.

"Charlie?" she yelled again.

"Here!" she swung around and saw Charlie stand behind her, he looked awful but he had a smile on his face. To his surprise Flor hugged him and then she smiled shyly.

"Sean and me were just here to get water, how are you holding up?"

"Good," he said and Flor raised an eyebrow and he chuckled. "All right bloody terrible. But there are things to keep me up, you can't believe what Margo and Zidler built in the jungle –"

"Flor!" Sean came out from the cave with a frown on his face. When he saw Charlie he relaxed and grinned. "Hey Charlie, are you feeling better?"

"I'm recovering, but I need to stay here a bit longer," he glanced at Flor who nodded.

"Yeah you do look horrifying."

"Thank you Sean," Charlie answered with sarcasm.

"You got the water?" Flor asked Sean who held up her backpack, she took it.

"We could stay here for a while…" Sean told Charlie but Charlie shook his head.

"You guys go back, I'm fine here."

Sean and Flor looked around at the empty caves, the threatening jungle and Charlie's red and swollen eyes.

"Okay, see you later Charlie," Flor took the heavy backpack over her shoulders. "And Charlie… whatever you do, don't go look in a mirror all right?"

She and Sean waved goodbye as they went back into the jungle. Charlie gazed after them. He wondered for a second if their whole conversation had been a hallucination.

Withdrawal was hell.

--

Kaylee held the rifle with ease and half ran through the jungle. She had no idea where she was going, but she guessed if she walked in one direction she would eventually come to the beach and then she could just follow that back.

"Have you checked the safe?"

Dom's voice still was in her ears, like she was a crazy maniac that had persons in her head. So what do the voices tell you to do? She imagined Kate asking her and she smiled to herself.

She came out from the trees and was glad she stopped, she was in front of a ravine and small stones fell down the edge.

"A bridge," she said out to no one. A small, death trap for a bridge was set up before her and she stared at it. There was no way she was going to cross that one.

She heard the loud shriek of a boar… no two boars… no more…

Or was that just her imagination too?

With a deep breath she went out on the bridge, it dangled as to tell her to get off. Or to throw her off. She took another step, then another one…

--

"Hey Fox! Freaky genius!" Dom shouted. "Got any idea where Sean is?"

"I – I think he we – went to the – the ca – caves with Flor."

"Just great," Dom sighed and then he glanced at Brian who had been talking with Fox before he shouted. Dom took a deep breath as to say something to him but then he turned around and rushed off.

"As to prove my earlier statement, they all think I'm a freak," Brian said bitter.

Fox admitted he had been proven wrong.

"When do you think Boone and Locke will be back?" Brian asked Fox who shrugged.

"I don't know," he saw that Brian seemed hurt by the fact that the two people he had spent most time with had just abandoned him when he was 'dying'.

"I at least hope they find Claire and Owen," Brian said. "And I hope they kill those who took them."

Fox gulped but Brian didn't see his nervousness.

"Ma – maybe they… they had their re- reasons –"

"A reason to justify kidnapping them? I don't think so. We should put a bullet through every single one of their heads."

Fox hoped Brian wouldn't put a bullet through his head at the end of the day.

----

Fox sniffed and his brother put an arm around him. Their mother was already walking away. Cold, unreadable eyes that never appeared to see anything. Not that there were many with sad feelings, a priest that had done this a million times before, a smelling drinking buddy, a tall woman with fake blonde hair and a frown. Nobody of them cried, maybe looked sad at the reminder that they were going to die sometime too. But not mourning the death of their father.

When they came home Fox got, as a reflex stiff, took off his shoes so there would be no mud on the carpet, tried to walk with a straight back so his father wouldn't complain. He forgot that he didn't need to do that anymore. The whole evening he prepared for his father to come home at five. Like every other day.

Now it was a quarter over, but that was fine. He would be driving slowly since he had taken a drink.

Now he was an hour late, but it was still okay. He had been later.

The night came, and when his brother started to snore in the other bed Fox accepted the fact that his father wasn't coming back. Never would be haunting him in his dreams. Never again would his father smell of alcohol and threaten him. Scare him to tears and leave bruises on his body.

Never again would his father take him in his arms, cry and say he was sorry. Teach him about the soccer games. Say he was proud when he came home with an A on the latest paper. Never again would he smile and say he was going to change.

Fox started to sob.

"Fox?" he heard a tired whisper, his brother sat up and rubbed his eyes. "Fox why are you still awake? Are you crying?"

His brother climbed out of his bed and walked over to Fox's. He sat down beside him and tried to dry his tears away but Fox continued to cry.

"Dad – Daddy is de – dead," Fox sniveled. Matthew stood up and Fox stopped crying with shock.

"So?" Matt said harsh, Fox could see that he closed his fist in the dark.

"He's dead!" Fox yelled.

"That's a good thing."

Fox went silent; he wished his brother would comfort him. Not stare at him with those judging eyes.

"He deserved to die."

"No… no…"

"Remember when he beat me up so bad I couldn't walk for a week? Do you remember when he hit mom in the stomach and it was blood everywhere –"

"Stop…"

"Do you remember when he hit you over the head so you couldn't think and threw up in school in front of everyone? When he took me by the throat so hard I passed out?"

"Stop - stop it…"

"Do you remember when he locked you up for hours and hours and you screamed and you cried and you had nowhere to move or to go and –"

"STOP!" Fox stood up. Anger and sorrow exploded from him and with a tiny hand he tried to hit his brother. "STOP!" he screamed again. "YOU SHOULD DIE! YOU SHOULD DIE INSTEAD OF HIM! YOU DESERVE TO DIE! HE DIDN'T! I HATE YOU!"

----

Boone glared at everything around him, which were trees and rocks but then he smiled relieved when he saw the hatch in front of them.

"Finally!" he took off his backpack and put it on the ground, Locke did the same.

"Now we must be careful when we light the dynamite –"

"What?" Boone interrupted Locke and he turned to face him. "We can't open the hatch now!"

"And why is that?"

"Because we need to get back to the camp, let everyone know we're safe. See if Brian's okay, get some food and sleep!"

"No Boone, this is more important –"

"I'm not staying," Boone stood up and started to walk away, with a sigh Locke decided to follow him, he hoped nobody would find the dynamite.

--

"Jack?"

Jack looked up and smiled. "Hey Lori," he said with uncharacteristic cheerfulness.

"Please tell me I went into the wrong tent!" she said, it had happened before. She shuddered of the memory when she had accidentally walked into Sun and Jin's tent one morning…

"Nope this is Sawyer's." Jack continued to pack medicines into his bag.

"So you're raiding it?"

"Yes." Jack saw some magazines and frowned when he looked them through. He quickly put them down and started to pack down the alcohol.

"Cool," Lori said after a while and surprised Jack. She felt her way beside him and then started to rummage through the things. Jack chuckled when he saw her excitement.

"Jack… oh, hi Lori…" Jack saw Shannon at the entrance of the tent. She looked shocked by the fact that they were stealing things from Sawyer but recovered fast.

"Jack I need to talk to you."

"Okay," Jack said but stayed in his seat.

"Alone."

"Oh, all right."

They left Lorraine alone in the tent. Jack wondered if that was a smart idea but Shannon looked dead serious.

"I want to talk to you about Rosalie," she said and Jack nodded. "She… she could move her legs yesterday."

"She could?" he had not seen that coming. Shannon's eyes were full with worry and he realized that this didn't seem to be good news.

"Yeah but now she can't. She could move them for a while and then it just went away."

"I…" Jack didn't really know what could have caused it. "Are you sure she can't move them now?"

"Pretty sure… Jack, I think she might not _want_ to walk."

"You mean she's depressed?"

"I don't really know," Shannon looked stressed. "Rosalie has lost everything; she's really strong but maybe… I don't know."

"I'll go check up on her later okay? What you can do is to be there for her, like you have been before."

"Okay, but she's not that happy about me right now." Shannon whispered. And Jack saw that underneath everything Shannon was actually mature.

Now he had to go see if Lori hadn't taken all the alcohol from him.

--

Boone cheered when he saw the camp through the trees and even Locke managed to laugh. The sun started to go down on the sky and they entered the camp. Immediately Shannon rushed up to Boone, hugged him and then hit him hard over the head before she rushed away again.

"Welcome back!" Michael said and smiled, the survivors greeted them and asked questions to which Boone and Locke lied. When the survivors scattered again Boone saw someone out of the corner of his eye. He looked to his left and saw Brian, standing up and alive.

"Brian?" he asked in disbelief.

"Robot," Zidler said before he and Margo left.

Brian waved awkward to them.

--

"I'm going to talk with her."

"Good luck Flor," Sean said and she smiled to him before she walked away.

The return of Locke and Boone had both crushed people's hopes and raised them again. They hadn't found Claire or Owen, but they had returned. The sun was fading away in the horizon and another day had passed.

"Lorraine."

"Call me Lorraine again and I'll show this up your –"

"All right, sorry, Lori," Flor muttered.

"What do you want?"

"I want your spot on the raft,"

"No small talk? Gee, you're awesome!" sarcasm, Lori smirked and was just going to take a water bottle when Flor took it away. She frowned and searched over the table with her hand but couldn't find it.

"Your spot on the raft, I want it."

"Why would I give it to you?" she bit her lip. "Have you seen my water bottle?"

"No," Flor answered and took a harder grip around it. "I need to be on it."

"And again we're at the start, why would I give up my spot on the raft for you?"

"I have to get off this island," Flor's words sounded useless in her ears. "Please, I have to be on the raft."

"We all want to leave this rock Flor. Sorry but that spot is mine."

Flor thought of what to say. She couldn't beg for a spot, she didn't have enough of a reason. She couldn't, she didn't want to tell Lori about her son.

"I could get you something, anything! I could do something for you…" she was desperate.

"Honey, I got everything I want."

"Books in braille!" Flor blurted out when Lori started to walk away from her.

"What?" Lori turned around and Flor smiled.

"I know where there are books in braille."

"Do you really think I would give up my spot on the raft for books?" Lori opened her mouth to call her pathetic, but something made her stop, she heard the desperation and frustration in Flor's voice. Sometimes you needed to quit in the right time. "Sorry Florence, maybe on the next raft. Not on this one, Michael says we're leaving tomorrow night and that's just how it is."

Lorraine left.

Flor blinked back the tears, Sean who had been watching from afar walked up to her and she hid her face away from him.

"I guess it didn't go so well…" he said gentle and sat down beside her on the 'chair's (more weird formed stones Margo had dragged there). "Maybe you should tell her about your son."

"No!" Flor said tearful, she was disappointed with herself and Sean took her hand.

"If it means you get to see your son again, why don't you do it?"

"Play the sympathy card you mean?" Sean still held Flor's hand and she didn't want him to let go, but she had to go and talk to Lori again.

"Yeah."

"I'll prepare the waterworks," Flor sniffed and stood up. She looked thankful to Sean and walked away. He watched after her. He heard someone shout at him, he turned his head and saw Dom rush towards him.

"Hey Sean, see I heard you were the one with the gun and I kind of need it right now!" Dom said.

--

Fox still wondered if he was going to have a heart-attack, he ought to ask Jack about it.

He had been scared and relieved when he saw Boone and Locke returning, he thought he had prepared himself for his arrival but he was wrong. When Margo had shouted 'they're back' he had completely lost himself to frenzy. He needed to be stronger.

He gazed over to Locke, Boone and Brian discussing. He guessed they were happy to see their friend safe. Or maybe they were just happy to have him back because of that thing they were working on in the jungle.

"Fox are you all right?" Sun asked him, she was building a fire.

"Oh… uh, I… I…"

"You look worried," she said in her calm voice. "You shouldn't be too concerned. Just because Locke and Boone didn't find –"

"That – that's not what I… I'm worried ab – about," Fox stammered and she looked curious at him but he didn't explain any further.

"You want to help us with the fire?" she asked after awhile and he shook his head.

"No… I nee – need to do some – something."

Sun looked stunned after him and she whispered something to Jin in Korean. He stumbled over to Claret and Allan by one of the tents. Claret said something to Al and he left.

"Hey Fox," she said.

"Hi," he greeted back and tried to stand brave.

"You know, they might not even come tonight," Claret said.

"I know they'll come," Fox looked bitter. "They'll come."

Claret didn't mention the fact that his voice suddenly sounded secure but bit her lip.

"You know what," she said after a while of silence. "He thought you would run."

Fox looked surprised up and met her eyes.

"He didn't expect you to stay."

"I'll stay."

"Why?"

"Be – because I… I have to."

"You never wanted to be one of them did you?"

Fox eyes grew distant and he whispered a no.

----

"Little genius," Matt said and patted him on the back, "you looked so ridiculous standing next to the others, half their size." He said and laughed. Fox blushed.

"I'm so proud of you," his mother said with a hoarse voice and he was pulled into a perfume-stinking hug. He smiled and his mother managed to draw on her lips too.

"Oxford next!" Matt shouted and raised his fist in the air and earned many glances from the girls nearby.

Fox laughed nervously, he was happy. He really was. But he was anxious. The idea of Oxford intrigued him and scared him half to death at the same time.

Fox hadn't really made too many friends in his class, as they all saw him as the little guy, so he would celebrate with his mother and brother alone. His brother sat down in the passenger's seat and he and his mother sat in the backseats.

The rain fell softly on the windows and his mother leaned towards him.

"Your father would be so proud," she whispered and gave his hand a squeeze. Fox saw in Matt's reflection that he scowled but to his mother Fox smiled and nodded. "He always wanted this for you," his mother sat back in her seat and took up a cigarette. "He wanted you to become a great man Fox, and look at you – you're so smart. Just like him."

"No smoking in my car," Matt said with unnecessary harshness. His mother put away the cigarette.

"If he only was alive to see this," his mother sighed. "Oh, how proud he would be, he always loved you so much –"

The car lurched and his mother let out a yell. Fox swallowed. He knew where this was going. He closed his eyes and tried to breathe slower to clam himself down.

"Mom shut it!" Matt said.

"That's not how you talk to your mother Matthew! If your father was here -"

"He would have kicked me in the stomach for saying that," Matt finished her sentence and Fox glanced at his mother who took a deep breath.

"Don't talk about your father that way…"

"Why? Because you're so truthful, oh your father would be so proud, he loved you – that's crap mom. Dad never loved us!"

"Don't you dare!"

"He beat us!"

"He was a good man!"

"MATT!" Fox screamed and the car crashed into the trees beside the road.

----

"Rosalie."

"Oh, hello Jack," Rosalie greeted him from the ground; he sat down beside her and accepted the mango she gave him.

"Shannon told me you regained control of your legs yesterday."

No small talk there.

"Yes, I… I could move them. Then it just… went away, I don't know why."

Jack put his hand on her left leg.

"Do you feel this?" he asked and Rosalie swallowed.

"Yes."

Jack frowned and took his hand away.

"And you're sure you cannot move them?"

Rosalie nodded and Jack sighed.

"Shannon told me about the fact that you might not want to be able to walk again."

"She has no idea what she's talking about," Rosalie spat, "of course I want to walk again!"

"But have you thought that she might be right?"

Rosalie hesitated. "No."

"Rosalie, you have lost – a lot, more than I can even imagine. I see you Rosie, and you try hard not to show it but you're depressed –"

"Of course I'm depressed!"

"No, I mean that you might not even realize it yourself –"

"I thought you were a doctor, not a shrink."

Jack chuckled but there was no happiness in his laugh. "Yeah, yeah I'm far from a shrink… but I kind of have picked up on some things. And I know that there are many stages of grief, and the worst one is when you don't deal with the sorrow. When you deny it. Push it away and act like nothing happened."

Rosalie looked down and Jack continued.

"Someone very smart helped me when I was going through them."

"Someone really smart huh?" Rosalie smiled and she looked up and met his eyes.

"Yes, but incredibly stubborn."

"You're the one to talk."

They laughed together and then Jack reached into his bag.

"I found this a while ago. I didn't look it through at first, but I did it today and… I think it belongs to you."

He held out something that looked like an old, dusty worn out book. But Rosalie knew better. Her eyes shone and she grabbed it.

"Thank... thank you…" she whispered and her voice was full of gratitude. He stood up to leave, but as she opened the first page he turned around.

"And, you know that Shannon just want to help you right? She really cares for you."

Rosalie nodded and he left. She smiled and laughed as she looked inside the book.

--

"So you already had those books."

Lori heard Flor's voice and sighed. Couldn't the girl just leave her alone? She put the book away and felt Flor sit down beside her. They sat together in silence and Lori cleared her throat awkwardly.

"Are you going to say something?" she asked after a while. She heard sobs and realized to her horror that Florence was crying.

"Oh," she gulped.

"I… I'm sorry," Florence took a deep breath and tried to get herself together. "I need to be on that raft Lori…"

"Flor –"

"No, just listen to me. Okay I really didn't want anyone know this, but I got a son. And I need to get back to him."

"We all got family Flor…"

"This is different… I haven't told anyone about this. Not even Sean, so please just… listen to what I have to say."

"All right," Lori said. And Florence began to tell her story.

--

Wendy saw the camp from distance and she smiled, Bonnie laughed with her and patted her on the back. Sawyer gazed at Bonnie's happiness and Sayid looked over at Sun and Jin who had noticed their return. Dom and Kate, both ready to leave stopped and glanced at the returners. Kate's face brightened up in a big smile.

Karl saw out of the corner of his eye that the man watched him, waiting for a reaction. He looked away and saw Wendy that had turned her gaze at him, their eyes met but she looked away.

Zidler embraced Wendy in a hug and Margo pushed him away to hug Wendy herself. Sawyer was attacked by Rosalie (who got there with the help of Shannon) and Sayid shook hands with Lorraine.

Claret walked over to Fox that just stood, fallen, broken and watching the survivors greet the newcomers. He saw their shock when they saw Brian alive and well, the survivors shock when they saw the two hostages. Then they turned their gaze to him. Wendy lifted a finger at his direction and he saw Jack's face drop in disbelief. Sayid marched over to him, his face twisted in fury.

"I know you are the traitor."

He was talking directly to Claret.

--

"Catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, never let it fade away, catch a falling star and put it in your pocket, save it for a rainy day…"

She sang to herself and skipped through the easy rain. The trees were small, thin black branches that scratched her bare shoulders. The ground was becoming muddier; her feet got quickly covered with dirt. She went over to the big hole in the ground, the tiger's trap. She pulled away the leaves and branches covering it and glanced down underneath. The little rain had already made a puddle down the hole, and the person inside had water above her feet. She looked like a drained cat and she looked up. She couldn't even see the dark sky above them.

"Who is it?"

"It's me," she chirped. "I brought you a banana!"

"Thank you."

She threw the banana down to the girl in the hole and she grabbed it.

"I know you were on the plane! But the others don't believe me…"

"That's okay sweetheart," the girl in the trap took a bite of the fruit. "Thank you again, now go away before they see you're here."

The girl hesitated, she wanted to stay longer. But the sky made threatening sound. The rain that before had been gentle started to crash down.

"What if you drown?" she shouted down the hole.

"I won't drown. I can swim."

The girl waved and the person in the hole waved back. She left hurried back into the trees

"Drop, drop, drop," she sang.

Drop, drop, drop the rain sang with her.

--

**Author's Notes:** Thank you all for your amazing reviews; nothing keeps me more inspired than hearing your thoughts about the chapters. And when I'm inspired I write! So… yeah, review!

I'm trying to do happy elements, but I don't know if I can write happy things (is this chapter happy enough or am I just crazy?). You got to prepare yourself for many things. I will be cruel to your characters. I just want to warn you since I didn't in the first chapter as many OC writers do, so I warn you now.

Bad things will happen to your characters.

And don't worry, Brian's healing, the weird endings and all that will be explained. I won't leave anything unsolved.

But it might take a LONG time for it to be solved, c'mon think LOST, last season and we still have no answers.

Namaste.


	13. Evil Things

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,  
Assailed the monarch's high estate.  
(Ah, let us mourn! - for never morrow  
Shall dawn upon him desolate!)

And round about his home the glory  
That blushed and bloomed,  
Is but a dim-remembered story  
Of the old time entombed.

_- Haunted Palace by Edgar Allan Poe_

_--_

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 11, Evil Things**

_--_

Everyone is evil.

Some believe that you are tainted by the cruel when you're born. That you need to spend your whole life making up to the evil in your soul, your heart. As soon as you are born human, you need to make up for sins you have not made, a past that has not existed. If you fail you get punished.

Who is evil then?

The one who has tried to be good, but in the end succumbed to darkness?

Or the one deciding whether you are good or not, the one giving the punishment?

Is it true that we are all dark at heart, that the smiles, the happiness, the goodness is just on the surface? A surface that will fade away until all that shows is your true self. The ruthlessness, brutality that comes with simply being human.

But will you give into it? That's the question. We can all torture. We can all be cruel. But will you?

That is the difference.

_--_

It was night.

No it wasn't. She blinked again and tried to make out what she was seeing, she was inside something… a tent. That was why it was so dark.

Her whole body ached with pain. Like she had been smashed into rocks. Shattered. Puzzled together again but the splinters still were still inside her body. She winced and tried to move. Something held her down.

She blinked again and realized she was tied to something. She couldn't move her hands or her legs. There was something on her mouth, dried blood, she wanted to dry it off but she couldn't.

She screamed.

Immediately her scream was followed by rushed voices, steps, questions and faces.

"This is wrong…"

"We need to keep her in one place!"

"YOU LET HER GO YOU DAMN –"

"What is she saying? Has Sayid gotten anything out of her?"

"What's happening, have you hurt her? What is…"

"She's just pretending…"

Someone put a hand over her mouth. She tried to fight it off but she couldn't bring herself to bite. Tears ran down her face. The man hushed her sobs.

"Be silent. We had to tie you up so you would not escape. So you would not escape back to your people."

She trembled with fear. Her eyes shone with panic.

"We know you are one of them now Claret. And you are going to tell me exactly where you people are, where Claire and Owen are who _you_ really are."

Sayid closed up the tent.

Now it was darker than before.

--

Earlier the same day, Claret had fainted of shock and fear when Sayid walked towards her. They had been stunned; no one really knew what to do. He had taken command and took her away and left the survivors with their confusion.

The joy of Wendy, Bonnie, Sawyer and Sayid returning had completely disappeared and got replaced by confusion, horror. The two hostages, the two of the other people had been captured by them. Simple people that had kidnapped two girls.

"This is Claret we're talking about!" Allen yelled, his fury clear. "Claret is not an infiltrator! Can anyone of you seriously believe that?"

Zidler glanced at Margo and they walked up to Allen, both on each side of him. Zidler patted him on the back.

"We're on your side man."

"I can't believe you guys. Ethan didn't seem like the psycho type either and he turned out to be one of them! Claret was pretty clever, acted like an idiot and then got sorted into the safe category."

"I got to agree with Bonnie on that one." Jack turned his gaze to Allan. "We can't trust Claret."

"What do you know about trust Jack?" Flor spat at him.

"I know that we found Claret out in the jungle. Supposedly the only survivor from the cockpit. She had a gun and refused to say where she had gotten it."

"She had a gun?" Boone looked surprised.

"Yes she did, Claret's –"

"Shut up Jack!"

Sean took a step forward and looked directly into Jack's eyes. He was angry.

"You talk about trust Jack. Did you guys know?" he turned and looked over the group, "that Jack here actually held Claret at gunpoint not too long ago."

"What?"

"Gunpoint?"

"I…"

"Is it true Jack?"

"I…" Jack looked at Lorraine. She was standing next to him, her eyes unseeing but her face turned towards him. "Yes, yes I did. But…"

"Do you expect us to believe what you say now?" Brian closed his fist.

"No, I'm sure Jack had reasons to –"

"To threaten an innocent woman?"

"Does it matter if she's one of them?"

"She is not –"

"EVERYONE JUST SHUT UP!"

The survivors went silent. Wendy had been watching from outside but now she walked forwards and looked over the people.

"We were on a search for Claire and Owen when the guy, the younger guy Karl showed up. He said he could help us and he did. He led us to a place, one of their quarters; there we found food, supplies and that other man, Henry Gale. And you know what we more found? Rescue."

"Rescue?" Florence whispered.

"Rescue. There are people coming for us, here, my guess is that the others didn't want that for us. But Karl did, he helped us. He told us about our traitor, Claret. And since he's been pretty truthful so far I think he's telling us the truth about this one too."

The survivors looked at each other, whispered, some hopeful some afraid.

"Claret is one of them."

"When she wakes up I will interrogate her, is that good enough for everyone? We must make sure." Sayid waited for any protests, none came. "Well then I suppose we must take care of our other prisoners."

----

Claret liked being a tour guide. What she didn't like were bratty thirteen-year olds that thought it was fun to try to run off all the time. Exhausted from her day at work she closed her eyes while waiting for the bus – and missed it. No one had thought it would be necessary to wake her up. It had been more fun to take her cell phone.

She had waited three hours to find another bus and when she came home she was more than exhausted, she could fall asleep standing.

"Clairy?"

"Yeah it's me."

"Lord, I thought you were a zombie!"

"Thanks grandpa," Claret hugged him and they went into the old house together. The lights were on and she breathed in the smell of farm, she loved it.

"Is that Clairy?" she heard her grandmother call.

"Yes!" her grandfather shouted.

"Well come into the kitchen you two. I made cookies."

Her grandmother Bella only made cookies when she knew Claret was going to be upset, she looked worriedly at her grandpa but he just smiled and they went into the kitchen.

"Here you go dear," her grandma said and gave her a whole plate. This was going to be bad news.

Claret looked up at her grandma. "All right, what is it?" she asked and with a little hesitation she took a bite out of one of the cookies.

"Uh-oh she caught us," her grandfather said cheerful. He sat down but her grandma stayed on her feet.

"We tried to reach you on the phone –"

"We really did!"

"But you didn't answer –"

"So we tried to call your work-"

"But you were out!"

Claret looked down. "My cell phone kind of got… stolen…"

"What?" they both said in unison and Claret shrugged.

"So why did you try to reach me?"

Her grandmother and grandfather glanced at each other.

"Well, Clairy… someone came here to the farm. You have to promise not to get mad, or leave!"

"Robbie… let's just tell her!"

"I just want to make sure she doesn't goes into a temper-tantrum!"

"Grandpa, tell me."

Her grandfather looked down and then he met Claret's eyes.

"Your father was here today."

----

"We can't go now."

"Why not Boone?"

"Because maybe we are needed here!"

"I agree with Boone, Locke."

Locke sighed. "All right then, we'll stay. Figure this all out – it's just that… this, what we're doing… it's special and you know that."

"That came off more creepy than special," Brian joked, he looked at Boone and Locke's serious faces. "Yeah but of course it's important… right, I'll go see if they need my help or something."

He frowned when he thought of how absolutely serious they were. Boone had been fun before, but as the days went he turned into a Locke-look-alike more and more. Of course it was important. But sort of dying changed your perspective a bit.

"Hey Fox!" he shouted. Fox jumped off from his place by the tree and looked bewildered at him. His eyes were red and he turned his face away.

"Are you okay Einstein?"

"Uh… yes… yes… of – of course," he said unconvincing.

"Have you been bawling?" not really manly Brian thought. But this was Fox.

"What?" Fox said and tried to act like he didn't know what Brian was talking about. Brian decided to let it go.

"Looks like I'm not the biggest gossip around here anymore," Brian smiled but Fox didn't seem up to conversation, let alone smiling. "Did you guess that Claret was one of them? I had no idea."

Fox didn't say anything.

"They're going too easy on them. No one has even tried to interrogate that Henry Gale guy or that little boy Karl. They're all just waiting for Claret. Al's going crazy. I think he'll try to set her free himself!"

Fox avoided his gaze.

"The most important thing is that they tell us where Claire is… and Owen also. They have been gone for a really long time now… what do you think they did to them?"

Fox walked away.

--

"Do you think we should still go?" Kate asked Dom in a hushed voice.

Dom hesitated. "We can't leave Kay out there alone for any longer…"

"But we might be needed here…"

"Yeah."

Kate looked at Bonnie and Sawyer who were tying the two other hostages up.

"I think they got it under control."

"All right," Dom took a harder grip around the gun in his hand. "Let's go."

He and Kate started to make their way towards the jungle.

"HEY! Where are you going?" Dom swung around, Jack Sheppard looked angry at them as he ran up to them in a fast pace.

"To find Kaylee," Kate's tone was unfriendly, Jack noticed it but he didn't seem to care.

"Where are you going with that gun?"

Dom glared. "We got it from Sean, thought we might need it if we were going into the jungle."

"Hand me that gun." Jack was serious.

"No!" Kate spat.

"You can't have a gun!"

"Oh yes we can!"

"Guys, what's going on?" Flor came worried over to them. Jack scowled.

"They can't take that gun with them."

"Why?" Kate asked. "We're at least not giving it to you."

"Yeah Jack, let them have the gun," Flor said. "It's not like they're criminals."

Jack thought of the mug shot he'd seen of Kate.

"We need the gun here for protection. We got three of _them_ here."

"Fine!" Dom said and handed out the gun to Jack.

"DON'T!" Lorraine screamed, she had run up to them. "Don't give that gun to Jack! Give it to someone else."

Dom nodded and Jack stood in shock. Dom put the gun in Flor's hands and then he and Kate, without looking back walked into the forest. Discussing with hushed, angry voices.

Jack gazed after them, then he looked over at Lorraine.

"Lori…"

Florence and she walked away from him. He could see the anger in Lorraine. Flor looked over her shoulder at him, and he could see she blamed him. It seemed like he had lost all their trust.

--

"She woke up, but then she went out again," Sayid told Lorraine and Sean.

"Of _fear_?"

"I think she wants to delay the conversation as much as she can."

"What are we going to do?" Lori asked.

"I think I should be the one to interrogate her. Then the others."

"You got experience Jarrah?"

"Yes I do. I know that there are doubts among us that Claret is really one of them. I plan to make sure of the truth."

"What about the other tied-up guys?"

"I believe we should all interrogate them, but when it comes to Claret it's different. As many here have gotten to know her, it would be best if I could interrogate her all by myself."

"All right. We'll sort out the deal with those others then."

"And I will go take care of Claret."

Sean nodded. "How about Jack?"

Lorraine glared. "There's nothing about Jack, Sean! He's not going near anyone of them."

"I just wanted to make sure you were on the same page as me."

"We'll discuss the Jack matter later, right now we must concentrate on this."

"Of course."

----

Claret grabbed the handle around the door. It was strange, round and too sharp. She pulled the door open and found herself in the room she had lived in as a child. But still it wasn't hers, it was strange, something she didn't really know anymore. Pale pink bed sheets and a pillow that had been worn out. A doll, blonde hair in a ponytail. On the walls there were old drawings, mostly of animals on the farm, sheep, cows and horses. One was of her and her family, except for her mother.

She took it down and grinned.

"How are you doing dear?" her grandmother opened the door but didn't step in, grandma always knew when to invade Claret's personal space.

"Just... looking."

"It's exactly like when you left it, haven't touched a thing, do you like it?"

"It's my room grandma. Of course I don't like it."

Her grandmother smiled and motioned to continue to speak, but her grandfather had seen what her grandmother was doing and rushed to the door. With an excuse he pulled her grandmother with him.

She liked that. That they all knew each other so well. They were family weren't they? She loved them. Still she had run out on them as soon as she got a bit scared.

Or when she got more scared, she was always afraid wasn't she?

She had left in the middle of the night. Angry, disappointed, all her exhaustion had disappeared and she didn't talk to them for over a month. Now she was back and they comforted her like she had never left.

She opened her closet, a few books and an old diary. White with green flowers she had painted there herself because she thought it was so boring. She opened the first page and she felt her heart twitch in pain when she read her own hopeful words, mom had gotten a new medicine, everything was going to get better.

"There are cookies in the kitchen dear!"

Apparently grandpa hadn't managed to hold her off.

"I'm coming grandma." Claret put the diary away and closed the door behind her. She wasn't going to stay in that room anymore. She didn't like it, not after... it felt as if there was a ghost watching her, but that was probably just her grandma sneaking up on her.

She walked into the kitchen, strangely clean and neat from the rest of the old house. A bunch of cookies laid on a plate in the middle, she took one and wondered where her grandparents were. Hadn't she just heard them calling?

She sat down, chewed slowly. She couldn't really enjoy the taste. Before she had been absolutely delighted to be here. It felt like home still, but still it was different.

Every time she walked past something she connected it with her father.

He had been in her room. He probably touched that table. He walked over this floor.

It should have made her happy, that he had been there. But it didn't, everything about the house felt tainted, like his abandoning cruelty had worn off on the house itself.

"Grandma?" she called out after she had taken another cookie. "Grandma? Grandpa?"

No answer.

She took the whole plate with cookies and walked out of the kitchen. She looked out through the windows and saw her grandpa sitting outside on a chair, his back to her. She walked out of the house.

"Hey grandpa, why are you sitting out here in the cold?"

Her grandfather didn't answer. And she walked closer.

"Pa?"

His eyes were closed, he looked terribly pale. Horrifying realization gripped Claret like a tight hand around her throat and she dropped the plate on the ground.

"What?" her grandfather stirred and turned to her. "Why'd you do that Clairy? And with your grandma's cookies!"

"I... I... didn't you hear me?"

"I was sleeping dear."

"Out here... in the cold?"

"The cold suits me."

Claret bent down and tried to save the cookies, it didn't was a hopeless case.

"Where's grandma?"

"I thought she was inside with you! Maybe she's with the sheep, go look for her if you wish."

Claret looked. She searched through the house. Went out to the old barns, looked underneath every table and bed. Rummaged through the hay house. Screamed in frantic when the night came.

She cried in sorrow when they found her grandmother's body in the nearby forest.

How she had gotten there she didn't know, one moment she had heard her voice and the next she supposedly appeared in the forest it took at least half an hour to get to? One more to get so far in it.

Maybe she was getting paranoid too.

----

"Where the hell are my things?"

"I think I saw Lori walking by with your books, Jack and Dom has shared your alcohol and oh, me and Margo stole your games, don't worry nobody touched your magazines, except Brian I think…"

Sawyer glared at Zidler who with a smile rushed off.

"Well, as he said you still got your magazines," Rosalie joked and peered into his tent.

"Where did the good old finders keepers rule go?" Sawyer complained. Rosalie smiled and he sat down beside her outside his tent. "You could have stopped them."

"Yeah, of course I could, even though I can't walk."

"Well Queenie you got that scary glare… yeah, just like that!"

Rosalie rolled her eyes and Sawyer smirked.

"So how was it while I was gone?"

"I regained control of my legs."

"What?"

Rosalie met his eyes. "Only for a while… then it just went away again. I don't know why."

"That's…" Sawyer didn't know what to say. "That's great!"

"What? It disappeared!"

"But you could move your leg for a while, that's called hope, stop being so glass is half-empty, it's good news!"

They sat together in silence, Sawyer felt a bit restless. He wanted to do something about the fact that there were three of the others there. But Rosalie had forced him to take some time off. Said he had been practically dying only to go on another trek hours after.

"So how did it go on your hike?"

"I already told you that."

"I mean between you and Bonnie."

Sawyer hesitated. "What about me and Blondie?"

"Do not pretend that you don't know what I'm talking about. I know you Sawyer."

"I still don't know what you mean."

Rosalie knew she was going to lose the fight. So she reached into her bag that she always carried around (Shannon had forced her) and took up the book. Sawyer watched her and his face brightened up in a smile.

"Where'd you find that?"

"Actually Jack did."

"Ah, I guess the crazy doc is good for something then."

--

They were tied up behind some rocks, outside the camp by some palm trees. Somehow the entire camp had moved to the left so now everyone was walking thereby as if it were nothing.

Bonnie glared at first, but she stopped caring after a while. Of course they were curious but that still didn't make them monkeys in a cage.

They had finally taken off the tape over 'Henry Gale's' mouth. Bonnie had started to doubt that was his name. Karl she believed, even though he didn't speak anymore she thought he was a good guy deep inside. Wendy would bring him out of his shell. But that other man, he acted as this was the exact place he wanted to be.

"Hey!" Bonnie turned around and gazed at Henry, but he wasn't talking to her. She looked at the shoreline, there stood Fox, terrified. He held some clothes in his arms and next to him stood Zidler and Margo, laughing and washing the dirty garments.

"Your time is running out kid!"

Fox dropped the clothes on the ground and in a hurry he rushed away.

"Your time is running out!"

--

She had wandered in the jungle for an eternity. She had heard voices, seen something black sneaking behind the trees. Scared, paranoid of fear she had fallen, exhausted by a stream to drink.

Pale dead blue skin. Grey lifeless eyes. Water dripping from his hair, arms, legs.

She screamed. Pulled herself up. Water splashed everywhere.

Then he was gone. The reflection of a dead man.

Maybe it was the loss of water.

--

"When Sayid is done interrogating Claret he will interrogate you too," Wendy told Karl while she changed his bandage. "But I have to warn you, he's an ex-torturer."

Karl met her eyes but didn't say anything.

"Just kidding," Wendy said and tried to smile. "I don't think he is. Not that he would be allowed to do something like that to you. We're still humans with morals right?"

Karl looked away.

"Fine, don't say anything. What happened to that chatty side of yours? If you just come out with everything we will keep you safe…" Wendy glanced at the survivors; most of them were casting angry glares their way. "Sort of safe, I trust you at least, even though you're mute and all."

Karl looked at her and their eyes met.

"What are you doing?" Wendy pulled her gaze from Karl's and looked up at Zidler.

"I'm changing his bandage," she said and frowned at the angry look in his face. "What's the matter?"

"The matter is that he's the enemy!"

"What? Zidler - what the hell?"

"He's a kidnapper and probably worse and here you are giving him cookies and changing his damn bandage!"

"WHAT?" Wendy stood up and glared into his eyes. She couldn't believe that Zidler was actually angry, at her. It made her mad. "What do you think I should do?"

"Well at least not treat him like he's in a bloody hotel –"

"HE'S TIED UP TO A TREE FOR CHRIST'S SAKE!"

"WELL HE SHOULD BE SOMWHERE WORSE!"

"What do you mean by that?"

"What do you think I mean by that?"

"They are people!"

"No they aren't!"

----

"The coffee has run out!"

"Oh God no!"

"THE COFFEE HAS RUN OUT!"

There was something special about how adult people, working in a stable job could freak out over something so small. But when you worked at this walkabout agency you became a coffee addict sooner or later, the word decaf had never reached these peoples' ears.

After an hour of running around like crazy chicken the delivery guy Jeff, Joe or something with a J came in - with coffee, poor guy didn't last long when everyone threw themselves over him.

Claret sat back in her chair and sipped of the coffee. Reports, she hated those damn reports. She sighed and continued to type in about the big millionaire Hugo Reyes' trip that never went off.

"Thimby, phone call for you!" Jessica shouted with her unnatural high-pitched voice and handed her the phone. Claret sighed at the use of 'Thimby' and answered it with a growl.

"Oh, is that how you kids answer the phone these days?"

"Grandpa!" Claret shouted with childish excitement, she saw that Jessica rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, yeah it is me, sorry I don't really know about all this time difference - is it lunch time at your work?"

"No, but that's okay. I got time." Claret shut off the computer screen and turned all her attention to the phone. "How is it at the farm?"

"Fine, Fine. How are you dear?"

Claret swallowed at the use of dear, why did everyone call her things she didn't want them to?

"Good, got good money, good work, good friends -" Claret frowned and gazed at Jessica. "Sort of good friends..."

Her grandfather laughed. "Good then? Good enough to take a vacation?"

"Yes, do you want me to come to the farm?"

"That would be a joy Clairy... but spending time with you is not the only reason why I'm calling you."

"You sound serious, what is it?"

"They have found more on your grandmother's case."

"Is there a case?"

"Now there is."

"What do you mean?"

"Clairy, I think they found the man who killed her."

----

"Fox."

"Al."

"How are you?"

Fox stared intently at the fruits he was cutting to pieces, he didn't answer.

"See, Fox, I and some of the others are planning to… well… not exactly rebel…"

Fox continued to chop the fruit to pieces, they were getting very small.

"We must put an end to what they're doing to Claret. It's insane, isn't it? You and I both know that this is Claret we're talking about, she's not one of them!"

"What – what do you wa – want?"

"I want to know if you're on our side."

"I…" Fox swallowed. The fruit was now smashed to nothing. "I… I don't thi – think Claret is… is an other."

"Good –"

"But I… I am not – not on any side!"

--

"Kid, we need some alone time with your boyfriend."

Wendy glanced at Karl who nodded slightly. Bonnie frowned. Wendy left without even glaring at anyone of them.

"Hello _Karl_. We're here to interview you." Sawyer said sarcastically. "Mind giving us a minute of your time?"

Bonnie rolled her eyes and they both sat down on a rock in front of Karl. Bonnie saw out of the corner of her eye some of the survivors glancing at them with curiosity.

"We'll start nice. What's your name?"

Karl looked away. "You already know my name."

"Not your last name."

"I don't have a last name."

Sawyer raised an eyebrow. "Is that so?"

"Why?" Bonnie asked.

The boy looked at them. "I don't know. Everyone just calls me Karl."

"How about Mommy and Daddy?"

"Dead."

"All right, let's move on to the next one. Where are Claire and Owen?"

"I… I don't know."

"Of course you don't."

"I am telling you the truth!" Karl's calm had disappeared. "Last time I saw them they were there, they must have moved them… and before you ask where, I don't know!"

"How were they? The last time you saw them?"

Karl hesitated. "Fine."

"Why did you kidnap them?"

"Don't tell them anymore Karl!"

"YOU SHUT UP!" Bonnie roared. She thought Henry Gale had been sleeping, he grinned from the other tree.

"That boy isn't going to tell you anything, everything he says is a lie!"

"I'll go shut him up!" Sawyer said and walked over to the tree.

The man looked crazy as he smiled at Sawyer. "I know who you are Sawyer, or should I call you James?"

Sawyer stared at him. Then he punched him hard in the face.

"Sawyer!"

Sawyer grabbed some duct-tape that they had left on the ground and plastered it over the man's mouth. Anger blazed from him when he came back. He ignored Bonnie's words and knelt down in front of Karl. He held a knife in his hand.

"Why did you take them?"

Karl pressed his lips together and didn't say anything. Sawyer grabbed one of his hands.

"Sawyer!" Bonnie grabbed his arm and made him let go of Karl. "What the hell were you going to do huh?"

"Slice one of his fingers off."

--

It hadn't been Peter. It had just been her mind playing her a trick, a cruel, mean trick.

Kaylee rushed through the jungle, running, sweat ran down her back and she cried with every step.

It hadn't been him. She hadn't heard Dom's voice. She was just so… so tired.

She fell.

She wept hopelessly in the ground. She had dirt in her mouth and eyes. She couldn't see.

After what felt like hours she pulled herself up on her knees, glanced at what she had fallen over. What she saw almost made her throw up the little she had.

It was a ripped off teddy-bear.

--

"Huh."

"What?"

"I didn't know you were mortal enemies with mangos Zidler."

"Very funny."

Zidler sat by the tree-line, at his feet laid several smashed mangos. It looked as if he had crushed them. Margo sat down beside him.

"So what is your reason for this mango massacre?"

"I'm just… irritated."

"Why?"

"Of everything."

"Of your silly fight with Wendy?"

"You saw that?"

"No, I didn't. Because you two had the fight _super_ private, by the camp where no one goes."

"They are our enemies."

"Not Claret."

"Yeah, not Claret. But those others… we have to find out where Claire and Owen are! At least Claire!"

Margo believed him, but she didn't believe that was the only reason he got angry when he saw Wendy and Karl. She wasn't totally clueless; she saw the way Wendy looked at Karl. In a way she wasn't really supposed to.

"You know what? Let's go do some evil things or annoy Sean or something."

Zidler smiled. "That sounds awesome."

--

"Everyone I'm back!" Charlie shouted when he came out from the jungle.

"When were you gone?" Scott or Steve asked.

Charlie glared at them offended.

"Charlie!" Wendy came over to him, she squealed and hugged him. "Are you better now?"

"Yeah, yeah I am," Charlie smiled brightly. Then he saw that the camp looked different than before. Closer to…

"Uh… who are those tied up guys?"

--

"Hello?" Kaylee shouted. Her voice echoed at the caves' walls, drowned in the sound of dripping water. "Is there anyone here?"

She didn't get an answer. She walked over to the waterfall's stream and drank greedily before she walked through each cave, searching for any sign of life.

No one was there.

Why weren't they there?

What if those others had taken them?

Was she alone now?

--

"Henry Gale. Is your name really Henry Gale?" Boone asked, paper and pen in his hand.

"No."

Boone was already writing, "Denies the fact that he uses a fake – wait, what?"

"Do you really think I'm going to tell my real name to you people?"

Brian and Boone looked at each other, shocked that he didn't try to deny anything.

"Uh… okay… so you are one of them?"

"Are you people really that dumb that you haven't figured that out yet?" he laughed.

"All right, you're one of them, Boone you wrote that down?"

"Yup," Boone answered.

"So, where are Claire and Owen?"

The man smirked. "Would you believe me if I said I don't know?"

"No."

"Okay."

Silence.

"You boys are really good at this interrogation thing!" he blinked at Boone. "Pretty boy over there is documenting like he's some kid of cop."

Boone scowled at being called 'pretty boy'.

"Where are they?" Brian raised his voice.

"You tell me Brian, you saw them yourself out in the jungle. Even had a nice little chat with Claire."

"What are you talking about?" Boone looked confused.

"You don't remember Brian? Don't you remember the reason you're alive?"

--

"She's awake now, for real," Sean told Sayid and together they entered the tent.

Claret sat now up, she wasn't tied anymore, she looked frightened and her arms were red from bruises. Sean swallowed but Sayid didn't even flinch.

"You know why we did this?"

"No… no…"

Sayid saw how Sean got doubt in his face, how all the determination to find the truth washed off, one look at Claret's fragile, terrified face made him partial, dumfounded. No wonder they chose her to spy on them.

"Sean leave us."

"What? No!"

"I am taking Claret into the jungle to talk to her alone. I am not partial. It is better this way."

"What… I'm not one of them! Please…"

"Sayid –"

"Sean, leave!"

Sean took one last glance at Claret before he left the tent.

"You come with me," Sayid said. He took Claret by one of her sore arms and dragged her out of the tent. She didn't fight against him. But her eyes screamed as they walked past the camp to the forest. He saw Allen stare after them, Fox turning away, Jack's angry eyes and then he saw Shannon. She stood closest to them. Her arms were crossed and there was something in her eyes…

Disappointment.

----

Claret sat in their kitchen, there were no flowers in a vase on the table, no plates of cookies, it was empty but a picture. She stared at it, wanted to burn it with her eyes.

"So that's my father," she whispered and her grandfather took her hand when a tear fell down her face. The man on the picture had brown hair, he was tall and had brown eyes. There was nothing special about him but the scar that went slightly over his left eyebrow. He didn't look different. He didn't look like her.

"Yes Clairy."

"I… I don't understand," she sobbed.

"Neither do I..."

"Why... why would he…"

"The police say he's insane, oh Clairy I didn't… I shouldn't have told you…"

"No… no, grandpa… I needed to know."

They sat in silence and tears continued to fall from her face, her grandfather got tears in his eyes and soon they were crying together.

"I still… don't get it."

"Maybe there are some things we aren't supposed to understand dear, but we must think that justice has been served."

"What justice? The fact that both of my parents are complete psychos?"

"Clairy…"

"What's his name?"

Her grandfather hesitated. "He has gone by many names Clairy, but his real name is José Gonzales."

Claret stopped crying and she swallowed the lump in her throat. It was just a name. It didn't change anything. Knowing what his name was wouldn't bring her grandma back, make her sorrow less.

She was just Claret, the granddaughter of two wonderful people. That was enough.

----

"What is Sayid doing with Claret?"

"I'm sorry are you talking to me Jack?" Lorraine asked coldly.

Jack looked at her. "Yes I am."

"Or are you pointing a gun at me?"

"You… you are mad about that?"

"Why shouldn't I be?" she asked.

"Because Lori, she's one of them!"

"You didn't know that did you, when you held a gun to her head?"

"I didn't hold it to her head… I didn't know."

"Don't talk to me Jack, okay?" Lori stumbled away from him; he followed her and grabbed her arm.

"Why not?"

"Let me go!"

"Not before you answer me!"

"Jack let me go!"

"Let her go dude!" Hurley said and Jack let go of his grip, Lori rushed off and Jack turned to Hurley. "Jack, you need to stop asking so crazy."

Jack looked down. "Yeah… maybe… wait! Hurley, you still got the flight's manifest?"

"Yeah…"

"Was Claret's name on there?"

"I… I don't remember."

"Then let's have a look."

--

"Is it inhumane? What I am about to do?"

He held up the knife as it was nothing, finger trailing along its edge.

"Do you think it is that way Claret?"

"I can see the fear in your eyes, the horror. It is convincing, that act…" Sayid put the knife so its cold blade touched her chin. She whimpered. A tear rolled down her cheek. She was tied up against a tree. They were both alone in the jungle.

"But I have seen many liars in my life. I know you are one of them. I can see it in your eyes. You are keeping something from us. All I want is the truth. Can you give that to me?"

"I… I'm not… one of them…"

"A lie."

"No… please Sayid, please I am not! I promise… I'm not…"

"Perhaps I would not go this far under different circumstances. But now two of our people are gone. One of them is heavily pregnant; she has probably already had her child. We can't have it that way. We must have them back. So to make this easier for both of us, you'll tell me where they are!"

"I… I don't know…" she sobbed. Her heart was beating in her ear. She wanted to move. The fear had taken over her.

"Maybe I believe you," his gaze turned to her hands and he put down the knife. She let out a breath of relief when he instead took up something that looked like sharp sticks. "But I have to be sure."

He grabbed her hand and twisted it around.

She screamed.

--

Kay held the rifle close to her as she walked between the trees.

They had to be at the beach. They had to be at the beach. What would she do if they weren't? No, they had to be at the beach. They had to be at the beach.

"Stop!"

Kay's eyes widened. She almost dropped the rifle in shock.

"Ro… Rousseau?"

"Put down the weapon." Rousseau stood before her. Still wearing the same clothes. She pointed another rifle at her, her look was firm. She had followed her the whole way.

"No!"

"You do not seem anymore saner than last time I saw you."

Kay scowled. "You're the one to talk! You put down your rifle!"

Rousseau smiled. "No."

"Then… then I'll have to shoot you."

"You will not shoot me."

"Why not?"

"Because that rifle is not loaded."

Kay's mouth opened in surprise but she quickly closed it again. Roseau was lying.

"Kaylee, I have been alone at this Island for a long time. But not completely alone, there are other people here, they took my child, my Alex. I think they infected my crew. But you are not one of them."

"So why won't you let me go?"

"You have the sickness."

"What? No!"

"I can see it in your eyes. I have been following you, I saw you talk to no one and I saw you scream at nothing. You have the sickness!"

"I don't have the sickness!"

"That's what my Robert said, before I shot him."

Kay took a harder grip around her weapon. "I thought you said the sickness killed them."

"Yes, they had the sickness so I had to kill them. Now I have to kill you."

"Sorry, but that just won't happen…"

They stared at each other, both pointing their rifles at each other. Kay saw the years of loneliness reflecting in the woman's eyes. All those years, alone I the jungle, no rescue. Kay could rescue her, convince her to come back to the camp. Find rescue once and for all.

Rousseau lowered her weapon.

Kay fired hers straight into Rousseau's heart.

"KAYLEE!"

Kay swung around and saw Dom and Kate emerge from the trees.

--

"IT IS NOT ME! IT'S NOT ME! I KNOW WHO IT IS… please… please…"

"Finally we are making progress."

Claret screamed again. "WHY DON'T YOU STOP?"

"Tell me!"

"A man he… he came to me in the jungle. He… I thought he was a survivor, but he wasn't. He was someone who had been here before, his name is Ben. Henry is not the leader… Ben is."

Sayid grabbed her chin and pulled her head up. "Tell me everything."

"He… he told me things, told me to do things, he… he scared me. I didn't know what to do. I was all alone… I was so scared. He gave me things, a gun… he told me what to do with it… I just… he, he gave me messages. Talked to me. Told me things. He said it was not going to hurt anyone!" she took a deep breath and sobbed. The blood dripped down on her legs. "They are not bad people. It was not them who took Claire and Owen, Sayid. It was not them. It was the other people, the people coming to rescue us. They are not bad people. I'm not a bad person. I never hurt anyone… I was just following orders…"

"Who is it?"

"What?"

"You screamed that it wasn't you, but you knew who it was. So I am asking you; who is it?"

"There is an infiltrator among us. Not me. He wasn't on the plane. He's on their side. I was going to tell you. But I never had the chance. He's the worst of them all. He acts like he's not. But he is evil, he may not know it himself, but he has done some terrible things Sayid, he's going to do terrible evil things. That's why they are coming, that supposed rescue. They are coming for him. That's why I got the gun."

Claret's face, before screaming and crying, scared. Was now twisted in a grin, it looked cruel, displaced on the sweet, panicking face. It didn't fit. It shouldn't be there.

"I was going to kill him. I was going to kill Fox Edwards."

"You are lying…"

"No… I'm not…" Claret's gaze went past him and her eyes got big in shock. She started to hyperventilate. Sayid turned around. It was too late, a fist came flying to his face and he fell backwards next to Claret. He stood up. A foot kicked him on his leg and he fell again.

"WHAT-" a punch, "THE-" something hard, a rock hit him in the stomach, "HELL-" he saw a glimpse of a blue eye, "ARE-" he tried to fight back, "YOU-" the rock hit his head, "DOING?"

He laid still on the ground. Blood dripped from his head, mouth, eyes. His arm was twisted in a strange angle. His chest didn't rise in breathing.

"Is… is he dead?"

Owen looked up and met Claret's eyes.

--

**Author's Notes:** Thank you for your reviews, thank you, thank you, thank you, I'm making this gigantic sign that says THANK YOU, you are awesome. But… quite a few of you reviewed, I know I got more characters than four! So please review more!

I also know I was intentionally leading you on, on the 'Ben/Henry Gale' part. In case someone didn't notice while reading… Henry Gale is not Ben, did you notice how weird it would be if it was Ben talking like that? Please don't hate me.

You know when I said I was evil?  
I wasn't kidding.

No one is safe.

Namaste.


	14. More than Love

I was a child and she was a child,  
In this kingdom by the sea:  
But we loved with a love that was more than love —  
I and my Annabel Lee;  
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven  
Coveted her and me_._

_And this was the reason that, long ago,  
In this kingdom by the sea,  
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling  
My beautiful Annabel Lee;  
So that her highborn kinsmen came  
And bore her away from me,  
To shut her up in a sepulcher  
In this kingdom by the sea._

_The angels, not half so happy in heaven,  
Went envying her and me —  
Yes! — that was the reason (as all men know,  
In this kingdom by the sea)  
That the wind came out of the cloud by night,_

_Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee._

_- Annabel Lee by Edgar Allan Poe_

_--_

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 12, More than Love**

_--_

"He's dead isn't he? Owen… you killed him! He's dead! He's dead… oh Lord he's dead!"

"Calm down!" Owen shouted at Claret, but Claret was shaking. Her eyes were wide and she started to scream. Owen slapped her. "Shut up Claret!"

"Is… is he dead?" she asked. Owen tied up the knots around her arms and legs. She didn't answer but just tied up the knots with serious determination. "He's… he's not moving is he?"

Owen looked Claret directly into her eyes. "Now listen to me. You have been tortured Claret. You are hurt, you are bleeding. We need to get you back to the camp all right?"

"Sayid… he's…"

Owen turned Claret's face towards hers. ""Listen! I am going to get you back to the camp. You are injured. But first I need you to be silent, I have just escaped and I wouldn't be too kind on getting kidnapped again! So you need to be silent."

Owen stood up and Claret looked at her hands. They were red with blood. Owen's hands too. Claret gazed over at Owen. She had taken Sayid's legs and started to drag him.

"What… what are you…?"

"I need to hide the body," Owen told her. "Otherwise they will really start to think you are one of them. You stay here!"

"I…"

"Stay okay? I will be back, don't go running off like a maniac!"

Claret looked down at her hands again. She tried to dry them off against her shirt and then she stood up. She swayed on the spot, her head was dizzy. She stumbled over to Owen and put a hand on her shoulder. Owen looked up. Claret's eyes were full of fear, but also of something else.

"Thank you."

Claret helped her drag him further into the jungle.

--

Kay hadn't realized what she had done before Rousseau fell to the ground. The blood spread itself wide on her chest before she hit the ground. Kate had screamed, Dom had stared. But they got it together quickly. Their time of running had put them in many serious situations; they could deal with it later.

They didn't have the tools to dig a grave, so they put her body underneath a nearby, sort of nice looking tree and covered her with branches. It was sick. She had been breathing, she had been living – they just covered her up with dirt from the ground. Not a proper goodbye, not a proper rest.

Kay told herself she was going to return and bury the body correctly. Save it from the fate of becoming rotten flesh, her corpse food to the animals. But she knew it wasn't going to happen.

They left the dead body in silence. Kate and Dom walked on each side of her but none of them touched her, said anything. What was there to say? That it was self-defense? Because it wasn't.

--

"Margo, you all right?"

"Yeah, of course I'm fine," Margo said between clenched teeth. She walked past Zidler and made her way between the survivors.

"Hey, are you all right?"

Margo glared at Bonnie who looked away. She stumbled into the jungle, just as far away as she knew they weren't going to see her. Then, she fell down on her knees and leaned her back against a tree. She was breathing heavily; she knew her eyes were red and her skin pale and sweaty. She tried to breath slower, but the panic built up inside of her. She whimpered.

She had been fine, she really had, she had been able to trek across the jungle, climb mountains, laugh, run. She hadn't been forced to worry, not one bit. And then she had woken up with a heavy pressure on her chest she couldn't get rid of.

She tried to breathe in through her nose, slowly it got better. She just needed to calm down. The only reason this was happening was because she had run out of inhalers, she was fine for now.

She pulled herself up when she heard something snap behind her. She swung around, freaked.

"Hey Mary," Owen greeted her, she held a frantic Claret by the arm. Claret's hands were dirty with blood and Owen's knuckles too. They both looked like they had been in a fight. "Missed me?"

----

Useless.

She always felt like that these days. Her life was an eternity of the same things, getting up, going to school, going home, eat, go to sleep. Day after day after day, nothing special happened. She didn't do something extraordinary. She just did the same thing all the time.

Her sister had an exciting life, she had done well in school, she was going to do great things her mother and father always said. She was going to do great. About her they didn't say much, what was there to say? Well our Margo she's… she's… uh, err, she knows… well, she's pretty.

But Natalie was beautiful. Her hair was dark brown, her eyes were also grey, but full of life. She didn't have a single freckle on her smooth skin. And it was easy to pale next to a sister like hers.

Margo loved Natalie, she really did. She just never knew where she belonged, while Natalie belonged everywhere.

Then she found it, something she was passionate about. Somewhere she belonged.

Margaret loved it, the feeling of the people around her, of the placards with the words Save the Environment written on it, the fact that everyone here amongst all the people thought and felt exactly like her, they were her real friends - that middle-aged old guy with the white mustache and the red-haired girl with fake fangs. Everyone, old or young, black or white, religion or no religion – it didn't matter.

Of course, she didn't like the sober feeling of getting locked up in a cold, hard prison cell. And being forced to hear everyone's taunting words and seeing her sister's disappointed face when she picked Margo up wasn't a party either.

"Why can't you stay out of trouble Margo?" Natalie complained when they were sitting in Natalie's opinion of a car, which in Margo's opinion was a dead carcass on wheels.

"You know why," Margo sighed and tried to make herself comfortable in the backseat, she was so tired.

"This is the last time you know," Natalie suddenly said out of the blue, just when Margo had started to fall asleep.

"What?"

"I can't bail you out anymore little sis, okay, I just can't. You'll have to call Mom or Dad –"

"Why? Why can't you? I thought you were my best friend – my sister, I will pay you back when I get a job you just have to be here for me!" Margo didn't know why she got so hysterical, but somehow Natalie never questioned helping her sister – until now, "and I can never call Mom or Dad!"

"Then you can stay in jail forever I guess," Natalie's voice was cold.

"Who… who are you?" Margo shouted angry "Are you having a bad day or something? All right I'm so sorry I got into the slammer, but if I'll stay in school all will be okay right?" she muttered the last sarcastically.

"You have to stay in school… and Margo you know that I want to help you but now I'm…"

"What? What are you Nat? A bitch? A betrayer, you know what? Pull over here, I'll go home!"

"JUST LISTEN TO ME!" Natalie turned around to face her sister "I don't have the-"

The last thing Natalie saw was her sister's terrified face when the truck hit them, the door window shattered and glass pierced her back and when the flames burst up, her bloody back was a shield.

Natalie did what she always did, she protected her sister.

----

Owen had changed. Not so much in personality. But more in the way she looked. Her hair that before had had purple streaks in it was now her natural hair color, she was wearing different clothes than when she left and there was something about her eyes ,(of course they were in different colors), but there was a look, if she had been condescending before she looked even more sure of herself now.

"I can't believe you guys didn't find us!" she whined and took another banana. The survivors were gathered around her and it was obvious she enjoyed the attention. She took a bite. "I mean, it's not like we were on another island or something!"

"Uh… yeah, we're all really sorry about that. Mind telling us what the hell happened to you?"

The sympathy the survivors felt for the kidnapped artist had disappeared as soon as they saw her again.

"Funny story," Owen smirked. "I was stalking after a pregnant girl and then Ethan popped up."

"Yeah?"

"That's pretty much all I remember from that part," Owen took another bite.

Bonnie frowned. "What do you mean?"

"I mean I was drugged. They gave me these pills or something… I don't remember much than that I one day decided to not swallow them. So I stopped. Next thing I knew I woke up in the middle of nowhere next to a teddy bear.

"Teddy bear?"

"Yup," said Owen.

The survivors stared at her in disbelief. Owen just acted like she didn't notice it.

"What... uh… what?" Brian asked.

"All right, I'll tell you every little detail! The kept me in a room, they gave me drugs. All black, I saw Claire once I think, she looked… pregnant. I remember a face…" she bit her lip, "it was Ethan I think who gave me the drugs. One day, stopped taking drugs and the rest you know…"

The survivors were stunned.

"I'll take another one…" Owen grabbed a mango. "I'm starving! So what have you been up to this whole time?"

"Do you know where Claire is?" Boone asked.

Owen frowned. "Didn't you listen? I stopped taking drugs and woke up in the jungle! I have no idea where she is, though I might remember the teddy bear's location."

Jack looked like he might explode with anger. Lorraine's face was expressionless and Wendy just stared with disbelieving eyes at Owen. The fact that she was so… all right, not hurt, just her usual self. She had returned, and it hadn't changed a bit.

"Hey, there's beard face!" she yelled and waved at Henry Gale who was tied up.

With afterthought, maybe it had.

--

Florence and Sean sat by the 'kitchen', they were both looking at Owen who was for a change arguing with Charlie, they both seemed to have missed it. Flor smiled faintly.

"That's so crazy."

"Pretty much totally insane."

"Yep."

Flor turned to the table and started to cleanse the fish.

"So you guys are leaving soon?" Sean asked and pretended to be interested in what she was doing.

"On the raft? Yeah." Flor looked up and smiled. "Tomorrow I think."

Sean made a grimace that was supposed to look like a smile. "That's great!"

"Yeah it really is, Sayid even managed to finish that sensor thingy before he… uh, went nuts."

"Everyone's nuts these days," Sean said. He gazed over at Jack who was sitting with Claret at the outskirts of the camp.

"How could he do that?" Florence said and cut the fish with unnecessary force. "Torture her… it's not something you do to someone. I never could've guessed he was… like that. Then just run off like a coward. Do, do you think he was a murderer?" she looked up.

Sean sighed. "I don't know. He used to be in the military…"

"So are you," Flor smiled and got back to her fish.

"Yeah."

Charlie came over to them. He looked irritated.

"Is Owen getting on your nerves?" Flor asked and Sean turned to him.

"No, it's the fact that she apparently doesn't remember where Claire is. Isn't that bloody convenient?"

Sean frowned. "What do you mean?"

"We are searching for an impostor, and who do we turn to first? Yeah, the panicking sweet girl! We should look after those who might have done something, who aren't that nice."

"If we are going to point fingers at mean people half this camp is full of infiltrators," Flor explained.

"Dudes!" Hurley rushed up to them, he was panting.

"What's the matter Hurley?" Flor asked worriedly.

"Do… do you guys know where the flight's manifest is?"

Charlie looked confused. "Uh… not really…"

"Oh, then do you guys know where there are inhalers? Margo… has kind of gotten an attack…"

--

"Where's Jack?" Zidler spat at Hurley.

"He's kind of taking care of Claret, but Lori's here!"

"LORI? Lori's no doctor! She's blind!"

"Thank you Zidler," Lori said calmly and knelt beside Margo. "Are you all right?" she asked.

"She's not all right! She can't breathe!"

Margo took the little strength she had and hit Zidler on the arm. He shut up.

"Margo, try to breathe slowly through your nose. You are just scared that the inhalers have run out. You don't have to be. Just breathe slowly… slowly…"

"I can't!" Margo sobbed and Zidler took a harder grip around her hand. It sounded awful, like her throat was all choked up.

"Breathe…" said Lori. "Breathe…"

----

Natalie's pale face almost blended in with the white sheets of the hospital bed, her eyes were nearly black and she almost looked like a spider, in a tangled web of tubes. But at least she didn't look as horrible as the person sitting beside her, clutching her hand.

Margo's nose had been broken and brutally displaced on her face, her earrings she wore in the car crash had in the shock wave ripped up both of her ears and they were scarred. But inside, Margo's organs and bones were whole. It just was that – she wasn't really.

"I'm… so sorry Natalie," Margo swallowed back her tears, stroking her sister's hand "I… I never meant to… I love you…"

Natalie pressed her lips together and stared up in the roof.

"Please… say something…" Margo whispered.

Natalie didn't answer.

Her mother and father came in with another pillow. Margo thought her mother had some idea that with enough pillows their star of a daughter would be all right. But Margo saw it, the way Natalie looked, she wasn't okay. It was not just the fact that her body was broken – she was broken in her heart too.

And it was her fault.

----

"I told you so," Rosalie said, her voice wasn't cheerful, she wasn't gloating. She had a frown on her face and her lips were drawn down. There was nothing good about it.

"Just because Sayid turned out to be Dexter doesn't mean she's innocent –"

Rosalie's eyes flared and she scowled at him. "Sawyer, don't!"

Sawyer saw how furious she was and for once he shut up. It wasn't like he approved of what Sayid had done. It was horrible. But that didn't mean Claret was out of the woods just yet, even though the other survivors seemed to think so.

He sighed and leaned back against the tree; enjoying the fact that Henry had a gun pressed against his head.

"Is that really necessary?" Rosalie asked him.

"No, not really." Sawyer continued to point the gun at the man. Rosalie rolled her eyes.

"I want to go talk to Shannon, help me get over there!" She put an arm around him.

"Do I have to?"

"You have to!"

--

"We're back!"

"Why's everyone back? Why does everyone go?" Scott or Steve whined. Kate rolled her eyes.

"Kay!" Something small attacked Kaylee.

"Easy there, don't want to choke her!" Dom said and Flor let go of Kaylee. She frowned when she saw how awful she looked.

"You look horrible!"

Dom and Kate had been nice enough not to tell her that. They thought Kaylee might burst into tears. Which she now did.

"Oh, Kay… I'm…"

Kate put an arm around Kaylee and she gave Flor an excusing look before she led Kay away from them. Dom looked after them and then he turned to Flor.

"She has been through a lot," he explained. "And when I say a lot, I really mean a lot."

Flor bit her lip and she was just about to say something when a frantic Hurley came up to them. He pushed Florence aside and mumbled something about already had asked her and turned to Dom.

"Dom, dude do you got inhalers?"

"Not really…"

Hurley swore and Dom and Flor stared at him with wide eyes.

"Margo had an asthma attack, Flor didn't tell you?"

"No she didn't!" Dom glared at Flor and he and Hurley rushed off.

"Why's everyone hating at me all the suddenly?" she complained.

--

"Margo, are you all right?"

"When did 'not breathing' become all right? No she's not!"

Dom sat down beside Margo. She was sweating and she looked most of all, scared. Zidler freaking out, Lori's swearwords and Hurley running around didn't help either. She looked at him and tried to breathe.

"We need to get you to Jack okay?" he said and put an arm around her.

"We can't move her!"

"Is Jack coming here?"

"No but -"

Dom pulled Margo up on her feet, she leaned against him and he shuddered every time she tried to breathe. It sounded awful. She looked even worse. He half-dragged her, not with the help from anyone else he noted, to Jack's tent, he was attending to Claret and had an irritated look on his face.

"Jack!" Dom shouted, Jack didn't look up. "Margo needs help!"

"Sun can help her –"

"No she needs help from you!" He helped Margo sit down and Jack finally looked up, he blinked when he saw Margo.

Jack was angry. "You told me she had a _little_ trouble breathing!" he yelled at Hurley.

----

Natalie had refused to talk with Margo for five months, never answered her pleads or responded her voice mails and Margo had in agony decided to just wait, wait for her sister to forgive her.

And when the phone rang, and it was Natalie's voice at the end – Margo just stood there fallen from the skies of the happy bubbly voice of her sister's.

"I… I can walk! The doctor said it was a miracle… oh, Margo I'm going to be fine!"

Margo clutched the phone and tears streamed down her face and she smiled, she smiled and laughed like she never had before.

"Oh Natalie," she said and her sister continued to talk, happiness in her voice. It made Margo happy too. She had her sister back, sort of.

"I'm sorry I didn't talk to you before… but now I'm coming home! We can see each other again!"

Margo nodded, and then realized Natalie couldn't see it. "Yes, yes."

"But…" Natalie's happiness faded a little, "Mom and Dad told me you moved out to Aunt Riley."

"Yes… I did."

"What happened? Did you have some kind of a fight?"

Margo was glad her sister wanted to listen to her problems, but Natalie was happy. She didn't want to ruin that.

"We can talk all about it as soon as we see each other."

"Yes, yes we can."

----

They were without a guard.

Fox looked to the left, Rosalie was sitting with Shannon and Sawyer was flirting with Bonnie. No one seemed to care about the fact that the two others weren't under watch.

He swallowed and walked with a fast pace over to his apparent good old friend. He looked up at him; he wasn't able to say a word because of the tape. Fox pulled it off and stared at the man.

"Well hello Fox."

Fox refused to look away. "What is this pla - plan?"

"What?"

"Plan!" Ben… Ben always ha – has a plan!"

The man's smirk came off. "Why would I tell that to you kid? You haven't reported in weeks! The only reason you're still breathing is because Ben has some sick idea that you might still be useful. But let me tell you, once he realizes you're not – we will get you. Ethan is just waiting to blow your brains out."

Fox refused to show weakness. But his fear was clear. He swallowed again. "Not if I blow his brains out fi- first."

"Is that so?"

Fox nodded. He looked down at the man's hands; there was something grey in them -

The man slashed with the knife across Fox's arm. He fell. The ropes fell to the ground and the man was now above him, knife in his hand. Fox had a hand over his wound and felt the blood pour. He whimpered. The man raised his knife.

Then there were two shots and Fox's world went black.

--

Brian had been talking to Locke and Boone; they had decided to open the hatch when the night came. But they should all have known that the universe somehow always tried to push it forward, at this pace the hatch was never going to be open. Still they made plans to open it at night.

Then he saw Fox, talking to the man Henry. They looked serious, like they were actually having a discussion. Nobody had managed that with him. He had also noticed that Fox was unarmed, and since Sawyer was busy looking at Bonnie he had taken the gun.

A few seconds later, Henry was on the ground, dead.

Or as dead as you could be on the freaking island.

"This is turning into a medical station!"Jack exclaimed when they brought Fox over to him. After an unnecessary long argument Fox won the 'who is hurt most' contest and Margo and Claret had to wait for treatment. Lori tried to help and had calmed Margo down with some of her, well, as Zidler said "freaky voodoo magic".

Brian stayed for one whole minute, which he thought was really brave of him considering the fact that it looked like Fox was doing a recreation of Carrie. Margo was freaking out and Claret just mumbled to herself while looking out at nothing.

"Brian," Jack said. "I need you to take Claret away from here, she's in shock and this is the last thing she needs! Take her somewhere safe."

Brian obeyed and dragged Claret along with him, she looked more and more like a zombie.

Somewhere safe. Like he could find a safe place on this damn island.

He gazed over the beach and saw Allen. He shouted and Allen looked up and saw him and Claret. Brian knew he and Claret were good friends. And as Claret fell into Al's arms, he thought that maybe there was one safe place, at least for her.

--

Zidler looked annoyed. Bonnie knew that there were many factors leading to that. Margo was in trouble and it was Dom who was sitting by her side right now and not him for a start. But they had to find inhalers.

Hurley had asked every survivor, and now they were both looking through everyone's things. Sawyer's too, Sawyer had a lot of stuff still. He had "accidentally" shown Bonnie his secret stash of stolen stuff in the jungle.

"There's nothing here." Zidler threw down the manifest (they had forgotten Hurley wanted it) and stood up.

"We'll go back to the camp and look more," Bonnie said but it didn't calm him down. He looked more frustrated and he turned his back to her and started to make his way back to the beach. Bonnie wished they could have the very irritating, but funny and happy Zidler back. But she had a suspicion that without Margo, and Margo without Zidler, was like the sun and the moon; they couldn't function without the other.

--

Wendy stared down at the body.

The body of Henry Gale.

The body of an other.

An other like Karl.

She gulped and she looked away, she wondered when someone would take care of it. She saw Karl sitting, still tied-up. He had a hard time keeping his gaze away from the corpse. She walked over to him and he looked at her instead.

They stared at each other for a while. Then Wendy knelt down beside him and started to tie up the knots.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"Are you going to tell us more?"

"What?"

Wendy looked into his eyes. "Are you going to tell us any more information?"

Karl sighed. "No."

"Then there's no use keeping you around. She let him free but he still stayed on the spot.

"What are you waiting for?" she asked. "Run, go, skip away if you must."

"Why?"

"Because the only option for you if you stay is to end up like Henry." It was the truth.

"Thank you," he whispered. He looked around to see if anyone was watching them.

"You can still visit," Wendy joked when he hurried away into the jungle.

--

Kay had finally stopped crying and had fallen asleep in Kate's arms. She put Kay gently down on the ground and covered her with a blanket. She wanted to take Kay to Jack, but he was busy patching Fox up and saving Margo. He had said something about giving her water and beside them were several water bottles Dom had brought.

"How's Margo?" Kate whispered while she looked over the sleeping Kaylee.

Dom sighed. "Horrible."

"Isn't it weird? She was able to climb up a mountain –"

"Yeah, yeah I know."

Kay mumbled something incoherent in her sleep.

"Who do you think it was? That Kay shot."

"One of them."

Kate nodded in agreement and they both went silent. Dom sighed again and stood up, "got to get back to Margo now." He turned around and started to walk, and then he suddenly halted.

"What's the matter?" Kate asked. She let go of Kay's hand and walked up to him. Then she looked at the place where the others had been tied up.

"He's gone!" Dom said and rushed off. Kate trailed after him and they saw the ropes, free on the ground. Dom swore.

--

"They are helping, breathe… breathe…"

Margo wanted to scream at her. She was soaked in sweat and tears. Fear dashed through her every time she let herself stop focusing on one supposedly easy thing, breathe, breathe, breathe. They helped those eucalyptuses or something. But was she supposed to do this every time she got an attack? What if she couldn't get them?

Her heart raced faster and she felt herself choke up. Lori tried to calm her down. Margo watched from afar how the survivors seemed to run around, worried over something. They were shouting at each other.

She wanted to ask what was going on. She wanted someone to tell her.

"Jack," Lori stopped the doctor.

"Is it better?" he asked and looked at Margo.

"Sun's eucalyptus thing helped, but she's still freaking out."

Margo glared and tried to breathe. It was like someone had emptied the world around her with air. Jack put a hand on her shoulder, she shrugged it off.

"Look, you will be fine. You're just panicking."

_Just panicking?_

"You need to calm down."

Was he crazy? Of course he was. He had treated Claret like –

"Doc!"

Jack looked up, Sawyer hurried towards them, inhalers in his hand. Margo could have kissed him with joy, or not really. Bonnie would kill her. But she was grateful. She relaxed and the tension left her. The panic that had been inside her had moved on to those around her, it was better now, okay even.

She wondered where Dom and Zidler were.

----

The family reunion was at least… happy… from Natalie's part.

"Margo!" Natalie cheered with joy and pulled her sister into a hug. Margo saw over her shoulder both of her parents glaring at her. She swallowed but smiled when Natalie looked at her.

"Another piercing in the ear?" Natalie said. "Little sister you're soon going to be all rings."

Natalie turned around and smiled at their parents. "You let her do that?" she joked.

"No we did not," their mother said between clenched teeth. Nat's smile faded.

An awkward silence formed and Natalie cleared her throat.

"So where are we going to celebrate?"

"At our home," their father said and smiled at Natalie. She walked slowly to their parents car, Margo stayed on the spot. Natalie opened the car door and then she frowned and turned to Margo.

"Aren't you coming?"

Margo didn't say anything and their mother coughed.

"No she is not coming with us."

"Why?"

Their father sighed. "She is not welcome in our home anymore."

Margo looked down at her feet and blinked away the tears.

"Why not?"

"She had misbehaved."

"Misbehaved? Are you serious? She didn't move did she – you threw her out!"

"We had to."

"Oh you had to, well then…" Natalie made her way over to Margo and put an arm around her sister. "I'm not coming with you either."

They had to take the bus. They sat next to each other on the worn out seats, staring out the dirty windows. They didn't say anything. None of them needed to. They were sisters. Natalie squeezed Margo's hand. They didn't have to say anything to understand each other.

----

"I do not have the strength to go on a search party again!" Frogurt, or Neil which was apparently his name whined. Some of the survivors muttered in agreement.

Sean sighed. "Fine, we won't go after him then."

Brian glared, it was clear that he disagreed with the decision. He wasn't the only one.

Owen frowned with her eyebrows. "What about Claire?" she asked.

"You said you didn't know where she was," Bonnie said.

"I know where the teddy bear is!"

An argument between Charlie, Bonnie and Owen erupted and the survivors watched with wry eyes. Finally Sean ended it.

"We can discuss the Claire matter in the morning, is that fine with everyone?"

Boone opened his mouth to protest, but was drowned in the painful cries from Claret. The survivors scattered as everyone tried to ignore the fact that Claret had been tortured and that Fox had been cut up. The night had come, but the clouds on the dark blue sky covered the stars and the moon. The fires gave them some light, but almost none slept.

Jack went back to Fox, he was sleeping. You could get tired after you had been attacked. Margo was better; she had calmed down when they had found more inhalers and Allen was taking care of Claret.

A quiet and tired Kate had taken Kay to him, while he examined her Kate had given him angry glances, she was still mad at him. After Dom had walked away with Kay, Jack turned to Kate.

"What happened to her?"

Kate gave him a mean look. "We're still trying to figure that out." She stood up and stormed off, he saw how she relaxed from her anger when she reached up to Dom and Kay. How easily she went from mad to comfortable. He didn't know why he had kept quiet about the mug shot. Maybe it was because he wanted to trust Kate.

"You're checking her out?"

Jack looked up and saw Lori behind him, she sat down beside him.

"You were a great help today," Jack said after a while.

"Yeah I got the talent, no - actually, I got a nurse's degree."

Jack stared at her surprised. "You have?"

"Always the shock."

"No… I know you could do it. Why didn't you tell me?"

"Why would I? We don't know each other Jack. Not a bit. I didn't know you would point a gun at an innocent woman. You don't know me."

"We could try to get to know each other," Jack said honestly.

Lorraine bit her lip. "I don't think you want to know me."

Jack gazed at her with wonderment. "Why?"

"Because I'm not really a likeable person."

Jack nodded. Lori couldn't see it but she knew he was smiling,

"Hey, you're supposed to say 'I like you' now, that's the point!"

Jack chuckled. Lori hit him friendly on the arm. Fox made a gurgling sound and by a second Jack was at his side.

"How are you, how are you feeling?"

"You – you ca – can laugh!" Fox told him.

--

"Here's the mojo-jojo thing Sayid made before he went, uh, nuts."

Michael took it from Flor. "Great, so you are ready to leave tomorrow?"

Flor nodded, Sun translated and Jin nodded also.

"Me too!" Walt chirped in, he was playing backgammon with Rosalie, she was losing. Actually, she owed him several thousands of dollars. Sawyer and Bonnie were sitting nearby; Sawyer was shining in the glory over that he saved Margo. Zidler and Dom were both glaring at him because of that.

Brian and Boone were discussing soccer, or football, or baseball. To Shannon's ears it all sounded the same. Maybe they had a conspiracy to bore her to death. She leaned back.

"Why don't you two just get a room?" she blurted to Brian and Boone, Brian chuckled but Boone looked offended. He was just about to say something when they saw Locke rushing towards them; he had an angry look on his face. Shannon thought he looked like a teacher who found that the children had been drawing ugly sketches of him.

"Boone, Brian," said Locke and stared at them. They both went silent and then a light went on in their eyes as if they remembered something.

"Oh right," Boone excused.

Shannon sighed. "If you forgot your date with your boyfriend you say you're sorry."

"Why can't you just go and do something Shannon," Boone snapped, "but sitting here and be useless."

"Right because you and Brian were _so_ busy saving lives!"

"You're always so –"

Brian cleared his throat awkwardly and Boone shut his mouth. He glared at Shannon who glared just as angrily back when they walked across the sand to the jungle. Shannon pulled herself up and looked over the beach; she saw Rosalie and started to make her way to her.

Then the sky decided it would be fun to drown them.

--

The rain poured down. The water droplets hit the ground like hammers and the survivors hurried to find some shelter.

"So," Zidler screamed over the rain to Wendy, who sat beside him underneath the kitchen 'table', "why so sad-looking?"

"I'm not sad!" Wendy screamed back.

"Yes you are!" Zidler shouted.

Wendy tried to dry away the water droplets from her face. "Well I'm not!"

They sat in silence. Well not really silence as there was a war in the sky between lightning bolts and thunder.

"I'm sorry!" Zidler yelled after a while.

"Of what?"

"At the way I screamed at you before!"

"Oh," Wendy whispered, but it was drowned by the sound of the smattering rain. "It's okay!" she shouted. Zidler gave her a thumb up.

"How's Margo?" Wendy shouted.

Zidler's eyes grew wide. He put his head outside and shouted after Margo. Then he came back in, he looked like a drained cat. "Better!" he yelled. Wendy took of her jacket and put it over both of them. Zidler was shaking with the sudden cold.

She saw something out of the corner of her eye and she looked at the side. Peering in stood Margo, her hair was as always pulled back in a ponytail and she looked like a ghost out in the rain. She had a look Wendy couldn't put her finger on and she was just about to call her in when Margo rushed off. Zidler hadn't noticed a thing.

----

"You are so grown up!" Natalie pulled her sister into bone-crushing hug.

"I'm just leaving for school –"

"In another country!" Natalie yelled.

They were at the airport. People rushed by them in haste, people accidentally walked into them all the time and people shouted and tried to drown their words. But nothing was going to stop them from saying goodbye to each other.

"See, school was good for you," Natalie said, still holding her sister.

"Yeah sort of," Margo grinned and pulled away. Before she knew it they were in each other's arms again, crying.

"I'll miss you!" Natalie sobbed loudly.

"I'll miss you too!" Margo cried and made a weird sound hat was something between a yell and a sob and several people gave them suspicious glances.

"You have to go now, take care sis, good luck, don't do drugs, don't sacrifice your life for a tree and don't even think about ending up pregnant until you're back!"

"Until I'm back?"

"I love you sis."

"I love you more than love," Margo answered.

They hugged again and then Margo left, waving goodbye to her sister. She didn't feel bitter that it was only her sister that said goodbye to her, wished her good luck. She was happy.

The plane went up in the air, she leaned back in her seat. Closed her eyes. This was it, her beginning.

She was going to do great things.

----

Rosalie and Shannon were sitting in Sawyer's tent. They looked out at the poor people still running around with a faint interest.

Rosalie opened her bag and Shannon smiled. She was still proud over to have found one as she said respectable piece in a plane crash. Rosalie pulled out the book.

"What's that?" Shannon asked, Rosalie smiled and opened it.

It was a photo album. It was filled with pictures of Rosalie, Sawyer, a dark woman with almost black eyes and a little girl with the most beautiful smile Shannon had ever seen.

"Is that… is that your wife?" Shannon asked and pointed at the woman, Rosalie nodded. "And…" Shannon pointed at the girl, "that's your daughter right?"

Rosalie nodded. If she said something she might burst into tears. Shannon took the album and stared at the pictures in wonderment. She felt a lump in her throat when she remembered that the woman and the little girl were both dead.

"Well if it isn't Sticks." Sawyer came in and pushed Shannon aside, she glared at him while Sawyer threw a smile at her. She put the book in the bag and Sawyer struck up a conversation with Rosalie. She didn't like being ignored.

"Wait," Sawyer interrupted, he stood up and took out an arm outside the tent and dragged Bonnie in. She was soaking wet.

"I like the rain," Bonnie said and took Sawyer's place next to Rosalie.

"Me too, when I'm inside!" he answered. Bonnie giggled, Shannon raised her eyebrow and she and Rosalie exchanged an understanding glance.

"I bet one week," Shannon said.

Rosalie smirked. "I bet three days."

Bonnie and Sawyer had no idea what they were talking about.

--

Kaylee closed her eyes. The rain crashed down and Dom looked down at her, she had a light frown on her face as she tried to sleep. Dom didn't understand how she could even try over the thunder. He looked out through the ten's opening; he saw Locke, Boone and Brian arguing in the rain. They were shouting at each other. He wondered again how Brian had just… healed. He watched as Brian and Boone walked away from Locke, probably to take cover. Locke himself stayed out in the rain.

He heard a sob. Kay was awake. Tears fell down her freckled face. Dom opened his mouth to say something, he didn't know what. He just took her in his arms and tried to comfort her that way. She wept against his shoulder.

"I killed her!" she cried. "I… I killed her…"

Dom held her closer. "It was self-defense Kay," he told her. "You did what you had to do."

"No… no…" she pulled away from him and looked into his eyes. "I _killed_ her Dom. I am a really bad person. I have done really bad things. I killed her."

Dom gazed into her eyes, green with just a tint of brown, tears welling up, they were red.

"You are not a bad person Kaylee Evans," he said.

--

Sean had woken up early, he was surprised that the rain had stopped falling and had been replaced by the upcoming sun.

He walked over to the body of Henry. No one had moved it yet. He swallowed. The bullet wounds and the rain hadn't exactly done him good.

He grabbed the man by his feet and dragged him away from the camp, behind the rocks and trees. He supposed he should burn the body. But it didn't feel right. He went back and grabbed a shovel and came back and dug the man's grave. It was sloppy, not that deep. But it was enough. He pushed the body down and started to cover up the hole again.

The sun raised more and more on the sky and when Sean was done the whole camp was up. The raft was finished and excitement hanged in the air despite the day before turmoil's.

He saw Flor packing the final things into her bag and he walked up to her. She looked up and gave him a big smile.

"Hey!" she chirped.

"You look happy," said Sean.

"I'm leaving to get rescued!" Flor looked incredibly cheerful, happier than he had ever seen her before. It was like she had taken down the sun and put it in her eyes. "I'm really leaving this island!"

Sean's smile faltered. "Yeah."

Flor didn't notice and she zipped the bag up. She then looked at him. "Can you believe we might finally be rescued?"

Sean gazed into her eyes. She still had the smile on her face.

"No I can't," he said, she looked curious at his words. And then he bent down and kissed her. It was quick, lips brushed against each other and then he pulled away. She had just stood there. Arms at her sides and she gaped at him.

"Goodbye," said Sean and left her staring after him.

--

The raft was leaving.

Sun gave Jin one last kiss, put the notebook with English words in his hand. Charlie collected the last pieces of letters to the families back home, Walt hugged Owen goodbye. Zidler looked over at everyone giving their farewells and pretended to say goodbye to Wendy, full with fake tears.

Michael, Jin, Walt and Flor waved goodbye as the raft crashed into the water. They put up the sail and the survivors cheered.

Lori, who never let the fact that she couldn't see get in her way, knew that Jack stood beside her.

"Goodbye," she said with a sad, but hopeful voice.

Jack who had been waving farewell looked at her. "What?"

Lori rushed into the water, half-swimming, felt her way to the raft's side. Somehow managed to grab it and pull herself up.

"Lori?" Flor yelled shocked.

"Didn't think you could leave without me did you?" she said.

--

The raft disappeared into the horizon.

Behind them, up in the clouds smoke found its way up to the air.

"What's that?" Zidler asked and pointed, the survivors turned around.

The smoke was thick and black, like a signal.

"It's them!" Sean looked at Owen, she walked up before them. And Sean saw something, how she stood, how she talked, she was used to be the centre of attention of course. But this was different, she was determined, confident.

Like a leader.

"It means they're coming."

--

"I want to come," Margo declared.

From arguing the survivors had finally decided to go to the black smoke. Mainly because if they could find the others they would maybe find Claire, and also because Owen said they were coming.

"No you aren't going," Sean told her pretty harshly. He put on the backpack.

"Why not?"

Sean sighed. "Because you aren't."

Margo bit her lip. Kate gave Jack some water bottles and even Allen was drinking out of one. She looked at her side; Zidler and Wendy were laughing and talking by the fruit stand.

"I want to come! Please, I can be helpful."

"Right, it's not like you have asthma or anything," Sean muttered.

Margo glared. "I have inhalers, I can come with you –"

"No."

Margo swung around. She hadn't noticed that Zidler had walked up to them. He was staring at her. In a way he had never looked at her before. Like he was angry at her.

"You are not going."

They left, without her. Zidler left too, without a word.

She felt frustrated, the tears she didn't want to come up in her eyes. The weakness she didn't want anyone to see. She could get angry, try to fight it off. But years of desperate emotions had taught her that if she now even blinked the tears would start to drop. Crying of frustration, nobody comforted that. She would be the child, the child that stomped her feet in the ground and the grownups raised their eyebrows over. But just like a child she thought that no one understood her, didn't get _why_ she had to come with them.

But life wouldn't let Margo be a child for too long, it was time to grow up. It was time for life to be cruel in ways she couldn't understand. For some it would be a blessing, for others their worst nightmare. But in the end, little Margo never had a choice.

Life would come and life would be taken.

--

**Author's Notes: **I love you guys. Thank you for telling me what you think and giving me such awesome reviews. I cannot get enough. I have a main outline for the story, but I still love getting suggestions and inspiration from your thoughts, they influence the story! AND MORE THAN 100 REVIEWS! WOW! THIS MADE MY LIFE. This means... I might reconsider killing... well, no, it has to happen. THANK YOU!

Thank you, and please review more!

Since NaNoWriMo is coming up (the national writing month), I will might have to abandon this story for a month. But do not fear! I will write a long, long chapter that will probably take a month to read for you guys!

The season finale is getting close…

Namaste.


	15. Deep in Earth

Deep in earth my love is lying  
And I must weep alone.

Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 13, Deep in Earth**

--

"What are you doing?"

He glanced at the woman standing before him. She had never said a word to him before. If he hadn't seen her hit the chef he would have thought she looked kind, beautiful even with her dark blond hair and intense eyes. If he had ignored the fact that she held a gun in her hand.

"I'm reading," he told her, "I'm studying extinct species of different plants incase –"

The woman grabbed his book and shut it with a bang.

"You are in my way," she said and raised her gun. He quickly jumped up from his seat when she pointed it out at the sea, at the bird flying in the air. She fired. He watched helplessly intrigued. He still didn't understand why they needed military persons, with their guns, cold stares and fast reflexes. He heard the men laugh, standing a long bit away from the woman. A soon as she pointed they tried to bring down the bird she had her eyes on before she could. It was a cruel game.

When the men got bored they called off the practice. The woman put down the gun in the holster and glared his way. Like it was his fault they had treated her like that.

"Why are you here?" he asked, he knew he was in the risk of getting shot but compared to the other men she was the only one he could ask this question and get a real answer from.

"Why are you?" she asked.

He took a deep breath. "I'm a scientist."

"I am the one that will protect you scientists," she answered.

He was glad she even spoke to him, and he was probably pushing the limits but this was the most information he had gotten so far.

"From what?"

She looked out at the waves crashing at the ship's sides. On the freighter's side it read with large letters Kahana.

"From the Island."

--

"Is that all?" Rosalie nodded at Shannon's packing.

"Oh, yeah I know. I wanted to bring another bag but then Boone got all freaked out so this is it."

Rosalie stared at the two bags Shannon was holding, and the five more Boone was dragging. She snorted.

"Sure."

Everyone was leaving the beach to go to the caves, it had been Owen's idea, and it had surprisingly been a good one. The whole day had been set to prepare to leave, and the sun started to go down on the sky when the survivors were ready to leave. Wendy and Charlie were helping Rosalie, and poor Zidler was forced to carry her things. Margo walked past him, grabbed a bag to help his burden and continued on in the same fast pace.

Jack and Brian helped Fox, he was still weak but he was going to be all right. Even though he seemed to want to break down in tears every time Claret was close. Jack was angry. He had wanted to come with those who'd left to the black smoke, but with Fox still recovering and with Claret… he had to stay. But he didn't have to be happy about it.

Kaylee was walking close to Dom, she didn't have many things and the little things she had Kate carried, despite Kay's protests. A frown appeared on Dom's face as they walked into the jungle, but Kay didn't think much about it, until she noticed the path they were walking on. It was worriedly close to the place where she had… she tried to remind herself that they had hidden the body. But it had been raining, what if – Dom took her hand; he had noticed her worry and confusion even though she hadn't said a single word.

Locke and Boone walked in the front; they were discussing with hushed voices until Hurley ran up to them and struck up a conversation about comics. They looked both slightly irritated of the interruption.

"I mean, The Flash would totally beat Superman!" Hurley exclaimed and waved with his hands as if to illustrate. Charlie snorted from behind.

"Did you say something dude?" Hurley asked him.

"Well, now when you ask, Superman would pulverize The Flash."

"No he totally wouldn't. He would –"

But Hurley's argument drowned in a scream. Sun stood, pointing a finger at a bush nearby, her face twisted in terror.

It was a hand. A hand was stuck in the bushes, pale blue with traces of blood. The worst, there was no body visible.

"Oh God…"

Locke walked up to the hand, he didn't touch it, but he walked past the bushes and let out a gasp of surprise. The survivors walked up to him but he tried to wave them off.

"You don't want to see this –"

Kay felt her throat choke up when she saw what was on the ground. It was Rousseau's body. It looked like she had been dragged and bitten several times. There were wounds on her body and her legs and arms were twisted in horrid ways.

Kay turned around, pulled her hand from Dom's grip and rushed to a couple of trees and threw up.

It was her fault. She hadn't buried the body. And look what had happened. It was sick. Sick, sick, sick.

--

To all of their shock, Allen was the fastest of them all. It seemed as if they let him, he would be able to run all the way to the black smoke without any interruptions.

They had been trying to get to the smoke all day, and it looked like the night would come soon. It had taken time, they had walked in the wrong directions, faced ravines instead of paths – it hadn't been easy. But now Sean felt they were getting closer.

But they needed another break.

Bonnie was still playing around with the Virgin Mary statue she had found by the yellow plane. You could imagine their shock, Sean hadn't believed what he was seeing, a plane. They knew there were other people on the Island, but he hadn't really wondered how they got there.

"My water's out," Sawyer said, then he grabbed Al's without asking. Al rolled his eyes but didn't object. Sean had noticed another strange thing; Al and Sawyer seemed to get along.

Sean leaned back against the tree and closed his eyes. He was exhausted; maybe he could get some sleep before…

A scream pierced the jungle.

"What was that?" Bonnie asked anxious and stood up before anyone of them. She scanned the area quickly and Sean pulled himself up. Al's face was white as a ghost's and Sawyer dragged him up on his feet.

"I think it came from that way…" Sean motioned for them to go and they followed him through the dark trees. It was a thick forest, and he couldn't see if there was anyone there. But the scream sounded close…

"Look," Bonnie took something up from the ground. They stared at it. It was half a teddy bear.

----

"What is it Parker?" Bonnie spat in the phone. She was stressed and several people were talking to her at once. She tried to wave them away but they stayed. She had a scene to shoot and she didn't want to postpone it more.

"Bonnie," he always used that tired voice for her only, "something has happened."

"Get to the point!" Bonnie snapped.

"It's Ava," all the sounds seemed to disappear around her, "she's been in a car accident…"

She had stumbled into the closest car and drove to the airport the fastest she could. She had argued and screamed at the poor man saying there were no seats left in first class, rushed into the bathroom to cry while glaring at the Korean woman who quickly walked out.

She washed her face off with water and looked into the mirror. The make-up was smudged and her eyes were red. She took a deep breath and refrained from hitting the mirror in front of her. Her daughter…

"It will be okay." Bonnie looked to her side and saw a girl, she had dark skin, tall for her age and a beautiful bright smile, Bonnie couldn't help but smile back and accepted the tissue the girl handed to her. The girl smiled and left.

----

"It was the others." Owen put the end to the discussion. She had looked terrified when they found the body, but in the flash of a second her confidence returned and she argued the whole way to the caves about why and how it was the others.

Fox knew it wasn't the others, it wasn't their style.

He sat down by the waterfall and tried to glare at Jack to walk away, he hated how they acted around him. He wasn't that fragile. He wasn't that weak. But when Brian patted him hard on the back, he regretted telling him that.

"Can I sit down?"

Fox stared at Claret. Her blue eyes looked sadly down at him. She was wearing a light yellow dress and you could clearly see the bruises and wounds that covered her arms.

What did you say to someone who had been tortured because of you?

Fox nodded. Claret sat down next to him by the water. He had never seen her as small, but now she seemed tiny. It was as if she had shrunk of everything that had happened to her. He felt the guilt start to well through him.

"It could have been you," she whispered. It wasn't needed, the chatter among the survivors was loud and nobody listened. "It could have been you that were tortured."

Fox still didn't know what to say. But Claret didn't expect him to.

"I wouldn't wish that upon my worst enemy. What happened to me. It's something that should never happen to anyone. Not even to you… That's why I won't tell them about you. It doesn't matter anymore does it? What side you were on, what side you are on." Claret took a deep breath. "And he agrees with me."

"He do – does?" Fox was surprised. Claret nodded and fingered with her hair.

"You can stay here."

"Thank… thank you."

They didn't say anything for a while. Fox hated himself. Claret was a good person; despite everything she wasn't angry at him, bitter. She tried to look forward.

"He said you would be wasted anyway." Claret didn't look at him, and her voice was suddenly cold. She stood up and left him alone. She disappeared around the cave's corner. The laughter and talk from the survivors filled his ears again.

----

Claret stared at the clock. Was it possible it went so slowly only to drive her mad?

"Ah, the eternal staring contest between the woman and the clock."

Claret glanced at the man on her side. She raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything. He was sitting nonchalantly, playing with the cards in his hand, looking smug.

Claret decided that maybe sleeping would make the time go. She closed her eyes, but as she did so the image of a man with a scar flashed up in her mind. She sighed and stood up, she couldn't sit around. She had to occupy herself with something. Immediately an Arab man came with a bag, he looked around.

"Could you watch this for me?" he asked. Claret sat down again.

"Yes, of course."

"Thank you," he said and left. Claret continued to stare at the clock.

The man on her side leaned in and looked at the bag.

"That could be a bomb you know…"

"A BOMB?" Claret shrieked and security rushed towards the bag.

----

"What if they come, what are our options?"

As usual, Jack sensed when people were getting too careless and decided to stop that. They needed to figure some things out.

"Don't the caves give us protection?" Wendy asked.

Jack looked around. "I think we need someplace to hide."

"But where?"

Boone looked at Locke, Locke looked at Brian, Brian looked at Boone.

"I think I might know a place where we all could hide."

Jack stared at Locke who smiled.

--

"Wow." Hurley stared in awe at the hatch.

Jack traced his finger along it. "How long have you been working on this?"

"Long enough to open it," Locke answered proudly.

"How?" Jack asked. He didn't mean to sound so harsh. But he didn't like the fact that Locke had been working on this for who knows how long.

"With dynamite!" Brian cheered, Hurley gasped in surprise.

Jack scowled at Locke. "What dynamite?"

"The dynamite is right here –" Boone stared down at the empty patch of land. "Uh-oh."

"Uh-oh what?"

"Uh-oh the dynamite's gone."

Locke stared in disbelief. Boone looked embarrassed but Brian determined.

"We got to find it."

--

"Where are you going with all that food?" Zidler asked.

Wendy looked down at the fruit, fish and mysterious green things she held in her arms.

"I'm really hungry," she explained and rushed past him out of the caves. Zidler shrugged and went back to stare at Margo, who knew he was staring at her and ignored it by staring at her feet. It was a weird entertainment for Dom, who had made a bet with himself of who was going to say the first word. Unfortunately, Brian decided to run in and ruin the fun.

"Everyone!" he called for attention and the survivor's heads turned to look at him. "We're going for another search –"

Scott or Steve swore.

"- For dynamite!"

"Is that a joke?" Margo asked.

"No, we really are looking for dynamite. There are some in the jungle and we need to find it."

"Like a treasure hunt?"

"What? No!"

"Then I don't want to come," Zidler went back to his place by the wall.

"We need it to open the hatch."

"What hatch?" Charlie asked.

"This is going to take a long time to explain…" Brian suddenly understood why Boone had insisted that he went.

--

"Who is Hugo and how did he get a hold of 156 million dollars?" Walt yelled.

Lori, Walt and Flor sat together on the raft, Flor was bored and stared up at the sky, there were barely any clouds. While Walt had grabbed the bottle with letters and was now looking them through.

"You shouldn't read those –"

"Yeah those are private!" Flor agreed with Lori. But Lori shook her head.

"- silent, read them loud so I can hear!"

Flor rolled her eyes and turned her gaze to Michael and Jin, but they were too busy arguing about something.

She could feel every wave underneath her feet; the sun blazed over their heads and burned her skin. It wasn't very comfortable on the raft either and she was already tired of it.

"You got a letter in there?" Lori asked Flor.

"No," Flor answered simply.

"José," Walt read, "this is a letter I should have sent you a long time ago – Hey!"

Flor had taken the letter, she recognized the handwriting and she took a hard grip around it. Since there weren't much private space on the raft she couldn't exactly run away with it.

"That's my letter," she lied.

"But you just said –"

"I lied!" she shouted at him.

"Read another one," Lori said cheerfully. Flor walked past them and over to Michael. She put the letter in her pocket.

"How is it going?" she nodded to the radar.

"I put it on a minute ago, nothing yet."

Flor bit her lip, she was disappointed.

"Hey, we've not been out here for that long," Michael comforted her and Flor nodded.

"Who's Montgomery?" Walt asked Lori.

----

"Ouch!" Lorraine shouted and fell to the ground. This was why she hated airports. Too many stupid people walking around and assuming everyone could see.

"What's your problem?" the man snapped at her as she stood up. "Are you blind?"

"Yeah, I am actually. Do you have the same excuse?" she snapped back. The man went silent, oh the guilt they all felt.

"Oh, uh…"

She didn't stick around for the man to stutter his excuse. She made her way through the crowd. She needed to find the right gate…

"Daddy look! An airplane!"

"Yes Ellie, I see it!"

Lorraine brushed past the father and daughter. She wished she could see it.

----

"Here you go."

"I can get food on my own Wendy."

"Of course you can." Wendy sat down beside Karl on the stone and he smiled thankful to her.

"Are you sure you can't go back to your people?" Wendy asked him.

"Yes I am. I helped you guys out and our leader – he's not really happy about that."

He drank from the water bottle and Wendy looked down.

"Why were you one of them in the first place?" she asked.

Karl frowned. "I didn't really have a choice."

"Do any of you?"

"Yeah, people want to be one of us."

"I don't understand." Wendy sighed. "But you don't have to explain."

Karl watched her. "I don't understand either," he told her.

"Sometimes it is better that way isn't it?"

They looked at each other and Wendy smiled.

"I better get back now," Wendy said after a while. She stood up but Karl grabbed her arm.

"Can you stay a while longer?" he asked.

She sat down beside him again; she didn't want to be alone either.

----

Her brother. Her brother would be on that flight.

And if Wendy didn't get a move on, he would be on the flight without her.

But it was as if the universe had decided that Wendy Reyes was not getting on that flight.

She went to the airport at a good time. Then realized she didn't have her passport, so she went back to the hotel and to her room. The room was cleaned out and the passport was gone. She fought with the receptionist who finally managed to give back her passport (during Wendy cursed her in three languages). And then she went back to the airport.

Only to realize she had forgotten her passport again, on the receptionist's desk.

"I'm sorry dear, but it seems as if you aren't mean to leave Australia." She smiled. Wendy refrained from hitting her.

Now she was running through the airport, sweating, bag in her hand, hair in a mess. People stared at her as she rushed by. She pushed a few people over in her speed.

"Don't close the gate –" she panted. "Please!"

When Wendy sat down in her seat and felt the plane take off. She was thankful for whoever that invented the word please, it had done miracles.

----

"Here's a good place."

"Finally!" Shannon shouted dramatically and helped Rosalie down on the blanket. They had both wanted to get away from the caves. Rosalie leaned back against a tree and opened her book. Shannon took out her nail polish. She was just staring to paint her nail when Boone came out from the trees.

"Oh," he said, "it's just you."

"What is it Boone?" Shannon asked annoyed. Rosalie looked up from her book.

"We were going on a search for dynamite, they said there were some people here – I thought…"

"What? That there were helpful people here? I can help too you know!" Shannon stood up and glared.

"I never said you couldn't."

Shannon looked at Rosalie who motioned for her to go. "I'm staying here."

"Okay." Shannon and Boone left, arguing like always.

Rosalie opened up her book again; she had gotten it from Wendy. But somehow the words blurred in front of her eyes, she couldn't concentrate. With a sigh she closed the book and looked up at the branches above her, she closed her eyes.

When she opened them again it was darker on the sky, but she didn't think she had fallen asleep. She needed to get back to the caves, but there was no one around.

"Hello?" she shouted.

She heard a whimper.

"Is there somebody there?"

She heard a muffled shout.

"I'm here!"

Then she heard a scream.

Rosalie was desperate, it sounded as if there was someone in trouble. She wondered how she was going to get to the person. She grabbed the tree and tried to drag herself forward with her arms, it worked, a little, but there was no way she would be able to get to the person in need.

There was another shout in pain.

"I'm coming!" Rosalie yelled. "Don't worry!"

She tried to drag herself forward, but her legs felt heavy and her arms weak. Tears ran down her face of frustration. Why couldn't she walk? Why? She crawled over the dirt, pushed herself forward, she could she a shape through the trees, someone sitting on the ground.

"Who's there?" the voice whimpered scared, then in pain.

Rosalie rushed forward, legs rising and then she crashed down on the ground again. The girl yelled in surprise. Rosalie looked up and met Claire's frightened eyes.

----

"Rosie," Lalita whined, "this is boring."

"Well find something to occupy yourself with," Rosalie mumbled from her book. Lita looked at her wife, smiled and leaned in and kissed her. Rosalie gave in for a couple of seconds then pulled away and turned to her book.

"You told me to occupy myself!"

Rosalie smiled. "Yes, but this is a really good book."

Lita stood up from her seat. "I'll go and look after Sawyer and Eva."

"Okay," Rosalie mumbled. Lita rolled her eyes but smiled warmly and walked away.

Rosalie turned a page in the book.

"Water for the Queen?"

Rosalie looked up and saw Sawyer stand in front of her, smiling.

"Where's Eva?" she asked. Sawyer sat down beside her.

"With Lita."

"No she isn't!" Rosalie's shrieked.

Sawyer's eyes got wide. "Oh."

Rosalie was little, but she was fast. She ran through the halls and practically attacked Lita.

"Where's Eva?" she cried.

"Whoa, slow down Rosie, isn't she with Sawyer?"

Sawyer came up to them panting. "No, she's not."

"What?" Lita shrieked. It was scary of how they both sounded exactly the same when they were scared.

"We need to tell security!" Rosalie was twisting her hands and looked frantic around. "Oh what if someone kidnapped her?"

"What if she went on the wrong flight?"

"What if she's trapped in someone's bag?"

"What if she only went to the bathroom," Sawyer smiled and pointed at Eva who just came out. She was grinning and ran up to her family.

"Why are everyone so worried?" she asked.

Rosalie opened her mouth to yell, but Lita grabbed the girl and held her close. Then she told her that she was grounded, forever, it was for her own good.

----

Brian held the torch in his hand; it was night and now even harder to find the dynamite as he could barely see where he was walking.

But it was quiet, and as always when it was quiet he began to think about it.

How he could live, when he had apparently been dying.

He didn't know how to sort it out, how to make sense of it. But it felt wrong, it all felt wrong inside of him. That he, he was alive. It was as if he wasn't supposed to be. It was a weird feeling. But him breathing, alive – it was not right.

"_Don't worry, I'm here, I'll help you…"_

He heard a whisper, like the phantom of a voice.

"_I'm back…"_

"_It's not the same anymore…"_

"_Sarah we can't…"_

"_I missed you…"_

He swung around; he didn't see anyone around him but trees. Fear gripped him as the whispers grew more.

"_You took him away from me…"_

"_I'll get the wine…"_

"_Only if you don't spill it on me again!"_

"_On the shoulder…"_

Some of the words were incoherent; some he heard as clearly as if they were whispered right to his ear.

Then he heard a cry.

He started to run to where he had heard the sound, and he started to hear two voices talking, one whimpering.

"I am here –"

"No, no I can't… I can't have him right now…"

"I can help you, listen to me Claire…"

"Claire?"

Rosalie and Claire looked up, he saw them. Claire was leaning on a fallen tree, panting and holding her big belly. Rosalie sat before her, scared and anxious.

And beside them were some dynamite.

--

"Hello Edwards."

Fox looked up from the book and stared at Owen who was smirking. Owen took the book from him and threw it away, he protested but she grabbed his arm and dragged him into another cave.

"What – what are you do – doing?" he stammered and Owen let go of his arm. He was happy it wasn't the sore one.

"So, Fox," Owen continued on in the same tone, "How have you been?"

"What?" He was puzzled and she grinned at him.

"Have you been good, sitting on the beach… doing nothing but enjoying life?"

Fox didn't answer. He wondered if Owen was crazy. She looked crazy.

Owen nodded slowly. "It must be pretty nice, like a little holiday being here for you right?"

"A ho – holiday?"

"Yeah, nice girls, nice boys, food… not getting tortured… Have you been enjoying that?" Owen stared at him, searching his face with her eyes. Her tone was harsh and that smile freaked him out. "Have you?" she asked.

"Err…" What was he supposed to answer? "Yes…"

"Good, because just so you know - it's not going to last." She patted him on the shoulder, smiled bigger and then left him. Leaving him wondering what they were just talking about.

--

Wendy arrived back at the caves. It was slowly becoming night and the jungle looked dark blue around her. With relief she stepped into the bright cave, warm fires burned to keep those inside warm.

She saw Zidler sitting by a fire, lonely, playing with his cards. She walked up to him and sat down on the opposite side of the fire.

"Hey," she said in a small voice and he glanced up quickly. Probably hoping she was someone else.

"Oh, hey."

Wendy fingered on a twig on the cave's floor.

"Are you upset about Margo?"

Zidler looked hastily away. "What do you mean?"

"Well she refuses to talk to you."

"Do you know why?" Zidler looked up.

"Don't you? I think it's obvious."

Zidler looked embarrassed. "Not to me."

"All right, let me explain it to you. You were pretty cruel to her recently."

Zidler searched his memories. "I was?"

"Yes!" Wendy rolled her eyes. "You told her off in front of everyone when she wanted to go with the search party."

"But… I only did that because she could get hurt! Her asthma and all that –"

"That doesn't change a thing for her. She's a girl, she's upset go and say you're sorry!"

"But I'm not!"

"Well do you want Margo to forgive you?"

"Yes but –"

"Then you'll admit you're wrong, go and find her and say that."

Zidler looked thoughtful at her.

"Go!" Wendy barked and Zidler jumped up, he was a bit scared of Wendy when she was angry.

--

Claire's sweaty face was yellow in the light form the torch. She was panting, whimpering and holding onto Brian's hand for dear life. There was no time for questions or catching up – she was going to have the baby. It didn't matter that they were in a jungle in the middle of nowhere, they had to do this.

They just didn't know how.

"I'll stay with Claire," Rosalie whispered to him when she saw that he glanced at the dynamite. "You can return with the explosives."

Brian glanced at Claire. She was too busy trying to breathe slowly. Someone had to take the dynamite back, open the hatch, maybe find safety for everyone.

"Brian…" Claire whispered and he gripped her hand tighter.

"I'm not leaving you," he said and she gave a faint smile.

"No… you have to… you have to get Jack!"

Rosalie looked at him. "She's right, and since you can walk and I can't then –"

"How did you get here then?" Brian met Rosalie's gaze and she sighed.

"You have to get Jack –"

"I can't leave Claire!"

"Stop talking about me like I'm not here," Claire breathed. "And I'm asking both of you; have anyone of you delivered a… baby?"

"Well –"

"Uh…"

"I have given birth!" Rosalie said. Claire stared at her.

"I can't believe this is happening to me," she cried.

"What was that?" Rosalie asked when she heard something snap.

"Maybe it was someone giving birth, oh no that's me!" Claire shouted and Brian tried to calm her down. Rosalie peered in through the trees but all she could see was darkness. Then she saw a light.

"Someone's there!" she yelled.

"Hello?" a voice shouted.

"We're here!" Rosalie cried.

Boone stepped out of the trees and stared at the scene before him.

"It's only Boone!" Claire roared and gripped Brian's hands harder, he thought it might break.

"Oh God…"

"Boone, Claire's in labor!"

"I can see that!"

Rosalie regained calm first. "Boone, you got to get Jack and take him here to Claire –"

"Yeah of course I'm going –"

"And the dynamite back to Locke."

"You're expecting me to hurry back to the caves with dynamite on my back?" He met Claire's gaze, she was crying, she was vulnerable. He swallowed and nodded. He took off his backpack and carefully put the dynamite inside while trying to block out Claire's sobs. It wasn't easy.

"Thank you man," said Brian.

Boone walked forward and looked Claire in her eyes. "It's going to be okay," he said and kissed her on her forehead before he left into the jungle again.

He was the only one who said that to her, Brian and Rosalie didn't want to lie.

--

"So how's Kaylee?" Jack finally asked Kate. They were trekking across the jungle, searching after the dynamite. Jack thought they were more going in circles in the dark.

Kate looked at him. She seemed to consider banging the torch over his head. "She's still freaked out."

"It must have been horrible for her being out in this jungle alone."

"Yes, it was. She's gone through a lot."

They walked again in silence. Kate was still upset with him.

"I saw your mug shot," Jack blurted out.

Kate swung around. "What?"

There was no return now. "I saw your mug shot. You were the prisoner weren't you? That the marshal was on the plane for."

"I don't know what you're talking –"

"Don't lie Kate. I saw it."

"If you saw it when why didn't you tell the others?"

"I don't know Kate, why don't you tell me?"

He was really close to her now and he stared at her, she didn't look away.

"Because whatever you think I did – I didn't," she blinked.

"What do I think you did?"

They stood even closer.

"Something horrible, something I would never do."

Jack found himself leaning towards her face, and she was not stopping him.

"Is everyone dating everyone?" Frogurt whined. Jack and Kate jumped away from each other. Hurley, Frogurt and Steve (or Scott) came out fm the trees. Hurley blinked at Jack who looked away.

"Have you guys found any dynamite yet?"

"No, not yet Steve," Kate answered and blushed.

"It's Scott!"

--

"You should try to get some sleep," Dom told Kaylee but she shook her head.

"No, I can't."

"Kay if you're worried that anyone's going to suspect you –"

"I'm not worried about that!" She fired a glare and he swallowed. Her eyes were dark. "I'm more worried about the fact that I kill –" She stopped and pulled the blanket closer around her.

"Kay I'm tired of this. It was self-defense."

"What if it wasn't?" she whispered and turned to him. "What if I killed her in cold blood? What would you do?"

"The same thing I did. Hide the body. Take care of you."

"Why?"

He looked at her. Her freckles, her curious green eyes. So familiar.

"Try to get some sleep," he said.

--

"I see lights."

"At the end of the tunnel?"

Bonnie rolled her eyes. "No, over there!"

They walked closer. Sean kept the gun ready. They saw a beach and the black smoke from the burning fire.

"There's nobody there," Al whispered. Bonnie lowered her gun and they walked carefully out on the sand. It was abandoned. Bonnie closed in on the burning fire, gazed up at the thick smoke.

"Why would they do this?"

Horrifying realization came upon Sean and he turned wide-eyed to the others.

"I think they wanted to trick us away from the camp."

"Why? That doesn't make any sense –"

Al stared at them. "I think it does."

"Trick us here for what reason? There's no one here!"

"They want us to split up," Sawyer said. "It will be easier to take us one by one."

"And exactly what has led you to that conclusion? An abandoned fire?"

"Al?" Sean looked to his side. "Al what is it?"

The man stared in front of him, at the jungle. His eyes were wide with shock and fear. Sean followed his gaze and gasped in surprise.

It was Walt. He was standing by the edge of the forest. Water dripped from his clothes and he had a single finger to his mouth. He was whispering in fast words. Sean blinked. And then he was gone.

--

Walt was sleeping, Flor and Jin too. It was only Lori and Michael up. He turned on the radar again and turned it off; he didn't want to waste the battery.

"No sign of a boat yet huh?"

Michael shook his head. Lorraine felt her way slowly over to the other side of the raft. She didn't want to fall into the water. She grabbed a bag; she didn't have her own with her and searched it for a blanket. She came across something else. She took it up.

"What is that?" Michael asked.

"Huh," Lori said.

"Is that _heroine_?"

--

"I hate you!"

"I wasn't even the one to impregnate you!" Brian complained. He had accepted the loss of feeling in his hand a long time ago as Claire held it even tighter.

"Why isn't Boone back yet? I hate him! Where's Jack?"

"Claire, honey…" Rosalie said carefully, "I think we might have to do this without him…"

"WHAT?"

"No need to freak out!" Brian tried to calm her. "Rosalie has given birth!"

Rosalie bit her lip. "Not that I remember much…" She saw Claire's look. "But enough to help you of course!"

"Where is he?" Claire whimpered.

"Claire, it's time to start pushing."

"How do you know?" she screamed.

"Honey, you have to. The baby's coming now, it isn't going to wait for Jack, all right, we can do this!"

Brian doubted it, he met Rosalie's eyes and he saw how scared she was, she was absolutely terrified. Brian felt fear grip him too and frightened thoughts crossed his mind. What if Claire didn't make it, what it the baby didn't make it?

"Okay, Claire… PUSH!"

--

Dom sat outside the cave's entrance. The people not out searching were inside sleeping. But he wasn't tired. He saw Shannon come out from the jungle, she looked horrible.

"Rough day?"

Shannon glanced his way. "I looked for dynamite."

"And it blew up in your face?"

Shannon glared. "Where's Rosalie?"

Dom shrugged. Shannon walked into the cave and left him alone again. He had been watching over Kaylee until she had fallen asleep and then he had gone out. He didn't know why but he just couldn't stay inside.

He was hidden in the shadows. He looked to his side and saw Margo stumble out of the caves, a bottle in her hand. He frowned when she walked into the jungle. He stood up and followed after her.

----

Kay was pressing down the tears, but as the marshal shoved Kate down on the floor and she desperately tried to reach the plane she couldn't hold them down. They fell freely from her face and the marshal smirked, happy to see her misery.

Dom tried to reach out for her when they were escorted on the plane. But he was in handcuffs and he couldn't comfort her, he didn't say anything.

"Some juice?" Kay looked up at the stewardess and whispered a yes.

"Get moving sweetheart," the marshal said and pushed her, Dom glared, but there wasn't anything he could do. He was helpless.

When they sat down in their seats he met Kay's eyes, she looked scared she opened her mouth slightly to say something.

But it wasn't needed.

----

"All right, who's a drug addict? Don't be shy!"

"You can count me out," Walt said. "I'll go back to bed."

Flor stared at the bag of heroine.

"Which bag did you find it in?" she asked and tried to sound innocent.

Lori pointed at the pile of bags.

"That's everyone's bags!" yelled Michael.

"Well excuse me for being blind."

"How do you know its heroine?" Flor asked.

"Flory, honey, I know it's heroine. I don't think it's Jin's because, well it's Jin. And not Michael since he was honestly shocked and not me because I'm awesome but you –"

"Because you're awesome?"

"Yeah."

"Can we deal with this in the morning, I'm tired!"

"Says the soul of a true drug addict –"

"Will you shut it for once!"

_Beep, beep, beep._

"Guys…" Michael ran over to the radar. Flor and Jin followed him quickly with Lori trailing after. On the screen was a red dot, coming towards them.

"It's rescue! It's coming, it's coming!"

"The flare!" Flor shouted.

"Yeah... right, the signal…" Michael grabbed it, he was fumbling with it because of his excitement but managed to set it off. Everyone's eyes turned to the screen.

_Beep, beep, beep._

"It's turning around! It's coming towards us!"

Flor yelled and hugged Jin, she even hugged Lori. Rescue had found them.

--

When Dom found Margo's trail again after having lost her in the jungle; he found that she had somehow made a fire. He walked out from the trees and she looked hastily up, but when she saw that it was him she looked down, as if she was disappointed.

He looked around at what she was sitting in, and stared in awe.

"Zidler and I did this," Margo explained.

It was a casino. In the middle of the jungle. Well, it was at least a resemblance. They had built some chairs, table, something that looked like a slot machine. A big sign with the word casino on it. There were some cards inside a jar – probably to keep it safe from the rain. But still, he thought it was amazing. But Margo, sat on the ground.

"Mind if I get drunk with you?"

She handed him the bottle, switching her seat and sighing. He sat down beside her by the fire.

"Why so serious?" Dominic asked with a look of worry in his eyes.

"We're stranded on this creepy, magical island with some guys that seriously needs therapy, dead bodies are showing up and rescue will probably never come. I got many reasons to be serious," Margo spat at him, her usual bright and happy face replaced with an angry one, Dominic never remembered seeing her ever getting mad, she was always the spirit and the other half part of Zidler.

But even the brightest could fall.

"Now everyone's just settling in with living here or – or going on suicide missions, we get kidnapped, stabbed every other day and still…" she was so furious she could barely get out the words, "hidden bodies everywhere buried deep in earth, lies… everyone's just… there's no hope!"

"You can't lose hope," he whispered and Margo eyes widened in shock of him actually being serious. "You can never lose hope, and if you do – the rest of us are going to feel so sorry for ourselves we'll eventually drown," he looked into her grey eyes, despite their color they were warm, she had a shade of green in her left eye – he had never noticed before.

He took a sip of the wine and Margo let out a snort.

"What?" he asked hurt.

"A sip? It's bottle up baby!" she grabbed the bottle and drank and started coughing immediately. It was obvious she wasn't used to drinking.

"I know how to drink, newbie," Dominic raised his eyebrow and took the bottle.

"Bring it on."

--

"PUSH!" Rosalie screamed. Claire threw her head back and pushed with all her force. Brian closed his eyes and decided that when he got off this island he would go into therapy.

A cry filled the air, the cry of a newborn. Claire released Brian's hand and stared up at the sky. Rosalie held a baby in her arms, she was smiling and the baby was crying. Brian gave her the spare blanket from his backpack and Rosalie wrapped it around the child.

"Here is your son," she beamed and Claire, even though she was exhausted took the little boy in her arms. He was small, little, fragile. Brian looked down at him. Tears fell down from Claire's face as she rocked the baby slowly back and forth, smiling like she never had before.

--

Locke was furious, with himself and with everyone else. Why had he been so foolish? To leave the dynamite unprotected around the hatch, he suspected a boar had dragged it with it, he didn't know how the boar had managed to drag dynamite along with it without exploding – but he doubted someone from the camp would find it funny to hide the explosives. Boone and Brian had gone to search, but none of them were back. He had lost track of time, all he knew was that it was night.

"Hi."

Locke looked up and saw Fox.

"Hey Fox, I guess you didn't find any dynamite?"

"I wasn't really look – looking."

"Oh."

Fox handed him a basket. Locke accepted it and saw some fruit inside it.

"I thought you – you might be – be hungry. Or, well Sun di – did."

"Thank you Fox."

"Hey Locke."

Locke turned around and saw Jack, Kate and Hurley emerge from the forest. They were all covered in something that looked like blood. Fox gasped.

"What happened?" Locke asked.

Jack put down the dynamite. Kate looked like she was in a state of shock. Hurley opened his mouth.

"You know, Steve… I mean Scott… he kind of got, blown up."

Locke stared.

"Yeah… but there was more dynamite than the piece he was carrying… and Frogurt…"

"Exploded too?"

"No, he just left for the caves."

"Oh."

"So, how do we do this?" Jack asked. Locke got over his surprise over what had happened and smiled.

"Now we open the hatch."

--

"Should we go back?" Bonnie asked.

"I'm too tired," said Al.

That settled it. They walked over the beach by some rocks and then a bit into the jungle, they wanted to be close to the smoke – but not too close.

Bonnie and Sawyer were conversing in hushed voices. Allen was snoring lightly and Sean was still awake but tried to sleep. After a while Sawyer fell asleep too, but Bonnie stayed up to keep guard. She listened anxiously to the sounds of the jungle, still wondering about the image of Walt they had seen, a hallucination that they all saw?

She would fall asleep if she just sat there. She stood up and walked lightly on the ground, not too far away she just didn't want to keep still. She gazed up at the branches. She couldn't see the sky, the trees were too thick.

She heard a strange sound, almost like something beeping. She frowned with her eyebrows and walked towards the sound; it seemed to come from some black bushes. She didn't have the gun with her and she regretted that. Still she walked closer and closer.

She saw something rise from it; first she couldn't see it because the forest was so dark. But it was something even blacker, smoke that emerged from the bushes in front of her. She held her breath. It rose up into the air, formed and twisted. White flashes. It surrounded hear, a clashing noise screeched from it.

She stood perfectly still. Didn't even breathe. Refused to make a sound.

She saw something, in the smoke, in the flashes. Images, small images. She stared.

When she saw death she screamed.

--

"How'd you get it anyway, I thought wine had all the Sawyer?" Dominic asked, obviously drunk as he barely could say the words. "Um… I thought Sawyer had all the wine."

"Ah, you see," Margo answered in a fake British accent "My dear Bonnie, got… the magical powers of getting anything she wants from him and so, my dearly beloved I got this…" she let out a drunk chuckle "this bo - bottle," she started to laugh hysterically.

"Wha – What's so funny?" Dominic asked in a drunk gaze.

"I… I've never – never been drunk before!" Margo continued laughing, rolling back and forth on the ground. Dominic started to laugh too and before he knew it, could comprehend what was happening - the laughter was silenced when their lips met.

--

"I see it!" Walt yelled and Michael ran up to him and looked over the water, then he saw it too. A light that came closer and closer. He, Jin and Flor started to wave and shout, Lori just smiled with disbelief.

"We're here! Over here!"

They started to see the shape of a boat, there were people standing in it. In front there was a woman. She had brown hair and intense blue eyes, she smiled.

"What are you doing out so far out?" she shouted.

"We, oh god, we were on a plane crash!"

"Yeah flight 815!"

"A plane crash?" she asked surprised.

"Yeah, yeah and we've been on this Island –"

"And now we've finally founds rescue –"

"Yeah we built this raft!"

"We're so glad you found us!"

"That's amazing," the woman answered, her cold blue eyes watching him. "But we're going to have to take the boy."

Michael stared. "What?"

"The boy and the flower, we're going to have to take them."

"You mean Flor – no! You are not taking them!"

The woman's smile disappeared. "I'm sorry you said that."

A shot was heard. Lori fell into the water. Two of the men in the boat climbed over and grabbed Walt, Flor kicked one of them but he hit her in her face. She screamed. Something was thrown on the raft. Walt was on the other boat, Flor too.

Then the raft exploded into flames.

--

Kate, Fox and Jack had already taken cover behind a rock, but Hurley was still by the hatch.

"Are you finished?" Locke shouted.

"Just a second!" Hurley placed the dynamite carefully. He was just turning away when something caught his eye. He stared.

4 8 15 16 23 42.

It was engraved by the side of the hatch.

His eyes widened, he turned around and ran towards Locke. Waving his arms.

"Don't light it! Don't do it! The numbers are bad! Don't do it!"

Locke stared at him. Jack gaped.

"Don't do it! Don't do it!" Hurley screamed.

Locke lit it.

--

Boone had rushed through the jungle. Despite the dynamite on his back he had hurried. All he could think of was the look Claire had given him, she looked so scared. He couldn't even imagine what had happened to her.

So he hurried.

But that didn't mean he knew where he was going. He tried to find his way through the endless trees, but soon he was lost in the dark. He could hear his heart beat in his ears. He had begun to walk, his legs tired, he didn't have much strength left. Boone found himself walking in circles, there was no direction. He needed to find help for Claire. Where was he supposed to go?

"I hate trees!"

"We know! You have said that for the past month a billion times!"

"I still hate them."

Boone stopped. He heard voices. He looked through the branches. He took off his backpack slowly. He took a step forward.

BANG!

"Kim!"

"You shot him!"

"He was one of them!"

"You still shot him!"

"He's cute."

"Not now sweetie, Libby will you take her away?"

"Okay, you take his feet –"

"Are you expecting me to carry him?"

"No I'm asking An -"

Boone passed out.

--

They walked slowly towards the hatch. Locke held his breath and they all gazed down. It was a black, deep hole. He couldn't see the end.

"Are we supposed to hide in there?" Fox asked without stuttering, Hurley stared at him in surprise.

"That's more shocking than this!"

"Locke," Locke turned his gaze to Kate, she was looking at something on the ground. He walked over to her, held his breath.

It was the hatch door, and it said Quarantine.

---

Owen looked over the friend on her side and smiled thankfully. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail and her eyes shone brightly.

"Did you ever think we would get here?"

The woman on her side frowned, crossed her arms and bit her lip.

"Oh don't be that way. C'mon, take a drink." She waved with a glass but her friend rolled her eyes and refused to take it. "Fine, be boring."

They sat in silence, and the sun disappeared behind some clouds.

"Have you considered the suggestion?" she asked.

"I have already said no."

"Please, you don't know what will happen if you say no –"

"They will be safe."

"Are you serious?" she said and chuckled. "Safe? Girl, we are never safe. So now let me hear, what's your real answer?"

"I just don't understand –"

"You do what we want and I won't blow his brains out."

"Why me?" she girl cried out desperate.

"Because," Owen put down her glass and looked serious, "you are the only one who can get away with it. Now, what's your answer, will you do it?"

Silence.

"Yes," Claire whispered.

Owen smirked. "Good."

---

The night was blue. The ship still crashed through the water, ruthlessly making its way to its destination.

"Why do you hide the knives in your shoes?" she asked in her calm, airy voice. She wasn't looking at her, but at the night sky.

"Why do you have violet eyes?"

The woman smirked and leaned at the shop's reeling, she turned her eyes to the assassin's.

"Why are you here?" The woman tilted her head to the side.

"Why are you here?"

The woman laughed. "I'm here to show that I can take care of myself."

She snorted; she thought it sounded childish, useless. "I am here to kill someone."

"Oh."

"Yes."

"Who are you here to kill?" The woman gazed up at the stars again. She leaned forward and the woman turned her face to hers, she looked deeply into her eyes.

"I'm here to kill Fox Edwards," she whispered and the woman giggled.

"What a coincidence," she said, "that you are here to kill him."

They went silent. They stood on the deck. Only the two of them awake.

"Tell me," the woman said and leaned in even closer. "Do you believe it was destiny that brought us here?"

Jóhanna turned her gaze up to the stars on the sky.

"No."

--

**Author's Notes:**

Namaste.


	16. Happier

_There open temples — open graves  
Are on a level with the waves —  
But not the riches there that lie  
In each idol's diamond eye.  
Not the gaily-jewell'd dead  
Tempt the waters from their bed:  
For no ripples curl, alas!  
Along that wilderness of glass —_

No swellings hint that winds may be  
Upon a far-off happier sea:  
So blend the turrets and shadows there  
That all seem pendulous in air,_  
While from the high towers of the town  
Death looks gigantically down._

- The Doomed City by Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 14, Happier **

--

"Nothing," Jack said and put his hands on his head, frustration and disappointment in his face. It was just a hole, a bloody hole in the ground.

They were standing around the hatch. It was a huge let down. He had expected a place to hide everyone; for everyone to be safe. But the ladder broke off in the middle and there was really no space for anyone down there.

"What now?" asked Kate carefully and Locke looked up.

"We go down there."

Jack stared at Locke in disbelief. "Why would we do that?"

"Because that's why we opened it. To see what's inside!"

"Now, we opened it to hide everyone in it! And by the looks of it, we can't."

"Everything we have done have led us here Jack! All roads lead here."

Jack shook his head. "Everything we have done? Locke, it's nothing down there."

Fox was still staring down it. Even though there was nothing but darkness at the end of it.

"Let's just head back." Hurley stood up and followed Jack. Kate was biting her lip and looked worried but trailed after them too. Locke stared after them as they went into the dark jungle then he turned to Fox.

"Do you want to figure out what's inside?"

Fox didn't say anything, he just nodded.

"Then we need to get some cable."

--

"They are back!"

Jack, Kate and Hurley arrived at the caves and were immediately greeted by millions of questions, even though it was still black outside it seemed as if everyone was up.

"Did you open the hatch?" Claret asked.

Jack shook his head. "We opened it but there's nothing to hide inside."

"Jack!" Jack turned around and saw Shannon; it looked like she had been crying. Her eyes were red and she had a desperate look in her face. "Jack, Rosalie's gone, Boone's not back either and Zidler can't find Margo anywhere!"

"I'm sure they're just looking after the dynamite –" Kate said but was interrupted by Kaylee.

"Dom's not back yet either."

"We're all going to die!" Claret shrieked.

"Hey! Everything's going to be okay. Let's just take it easy. We're going to be alright. We're going to stay here tonight, okay, together. We've still got 3 guns. We'll put lookouts at all the entrances. We're all going to be safe as long as we stay together." Jack looked around at the survivors.

"The sun comes up in 3 hours and we're all going to be here to see that happen. Don't worry about those missing, I am sure they are fine and will be back soon. I promise"

"And as always he keeps them."

Jack turned around, at the cave's entrance three people stood.

"Claire!" Charlie breathed and Jack's eyes got wide.

--

Locke fastened the cable around Fox.

"Are you sure you want to do this?"

Fox nodded and Locke smiled.

"I will lower you down when the ladder stops."

"What do - do I say if I wa - want you to stop?"

Locke's smile grew bigger. "Stop."

Fox took a deep breath and started to go down the hatch. Locke held hard onto the cable.

"Are you okay?" he shouted.

"Ye – yes."

"Good."

He continued to lower Fox down.

"Stop!" Fox screamed.

"What – what is it?"

"I… I drop – dropped my flash – flashlight."

"Oh." Locke continued to lower him down, despite his vague protests.

Fox tried to count backwards from one hundred as he was lowered down the hatch. He kept his eyes up, to the light as the darkness started to well in on him from every side. He was terrified.

"Locke… Locke I – I think I heard some – something. I thi – think there's something do – down there."

"Fox, are you alright?"

A light flooded into the sky. Floodlight.

Fox screamed and then something was pulling at the other end of the cable. Locke held onto it with all his strength and his hands burned.

"Fox! Fox are you alright?" he screamed and then he fell backwards. There was nothing at the other end of the cable to hold.

--

"There was something – a black smoke. I saw it, I saw it there!"

"Princess, the black smoke is out on the beach."

"I know what I saw Sawyer!" Bonnie yelled at him.

"Are you sure it wasn't just a dream?" Sean asked.

Bonnie glared at him. "It wasn't a dream, weird stuff happens on this island. We all saw Walt even though he is out there in the sea!"

"A hallucination?"

"That we all saw?"

"I was talking about you Bonnie."

"I know what I saw."

"Good for you," Sawyer said. "May we all get some sleep now?"

Bonnie pushed him aside and muttered to herself. She walked over to her backpack and hanged it over her shoulders.

"What are you doing?" Sawyer asked and walked after her.

"I'm going back to the caves."

"The hell you are!"

She turned around. "And what can you possibly do to stop me?"

Sawyer took out his gun. "I could shoot you."

"No one's shooting anybody!" said Allan. "I believe you Bonnie. There, can we stay now and maybe get at least one hour sleep?"

Sawyer scowled but put away his gun when Bonnie walked back and took off her backpack. Sean was curious enough smiling. But they were too tired to ask why it was so amusing.

--

"IF YOU SCREAM WALT AGAIN I WILL SHOOT YOU, YOU MORON!" Lorraine roared.

Michael muttered something about getting cranky over a bullet wound.

They were floating on rests of the raft. Jin and Lori shared one thankfully and Michael was on another one close by. Lori had gotten shot in the shoulder. Jin and Michael were okay. But Walt and Flor had been kidnapped, which no one of course considered good.

Jin said something comforting to Lori in Korean and examined her shoulder. Not that he could do much. Her shirt was smeared with blood.

"The bullet's still in there," she told him even though he couldn't understand. Jin said something else.

They went silent. Lori was glad Michael had stopped screaming Walt. She was also glad it was dark, so that only Jin could see her tears. And he didn't know English so he couldn't nag her about it.

"Why do you think they did that?" she asked after a while, tried to get her mind of the pain. Her shoulder hurt like hell.

"They are others," Michael answered with a tired voice.

Lori nodded. "Yeah but why?"

"You are asking me why they took my son?"

Lori looked down and didn't say anything more.

----

"Oh c'mon Lori!" Her friend Cassie said desperately from her seat in the car. "Let's just go. You don't have to do this. Just because your brother -"

"Shut up."

Cassie sighed, Lori knew she hated it. Driving her best friend around all the time. But all Lori had to do was reminding her that she was blind and the pity took in and Cassie would do anything for her. Lori stepped out of the car and Cassie too. She was the one who made sure the dealers didn't try to trick her.

"Hello again ladies."

Lori smelled the usual scent of alcohol and cigarettes from the woman. She leaned forward.

"The usual," she said and held out the money, Cassie stood quietly by her side.

The woman put the drugs in her hand and grabbed the money. Lori swallowed. She felt what the woman had done. She could sense it, the blood, the gun. But it didn't matter, she had her stuff.

"Sure you don't want anything sweetheart?"

Cassie mumbled a no, took Lorraine by her arm and dragged her to the car. The woman sniggered as they both stepped into it.

"This is the last time!" she yelled when they drove away from the alley. "This is definitely the last time I'll do anything for you!"

Lori shrugged. She didn't care. Cassie always said that. Next time Lori wanted more she would be right back in her seat.

----

"He's kind of cute."

"Kind of?" Brian shouted. But both Claire and Owen ignored him.

"He is isn't he?" Claire beamed. Brian wondered if her happiness had grown some filters against hidden insults. "You want to hold him?"

"Um, okay." Owen carefully took the baby from Claire's arms. Held him in a couple of seconds and then gave him back to Claire quickly.

The survivors, all in a ring around Claire, stared with doubt. Had Claire really let Owen of all people hold her child? She had yet to explain her kidnap. Brian told everyone she needed rest and when Jack also told them that, they finally scattered and let him examine her.

Owen was standing close by. Jack hadn't dared to tell her to go.

"Rosalie delivered the baby?" he asked. Shannon had screamed when she saw Rosalie up on her legs. Practically attacked her and dragged away with her before anyone could ask her any questions.

"Yeah." Brian nodded.

"It's amazing. The baby's perfectly healthy and you Claire, you just need some rest."

Claire was still smiling, but she looked tired.

"I can take him while you sleep –"

"No!" she suddenly snapped and her happiness was gone. "No one's taking him."

"We're not taking him Claire, you need to sleep. We'll just look after him."

"No!"

"Claire…" Owen put a hand on her shoulder, "let them take care of him just for a little while. You need some sleep. Tomorrow you can tell everyone what happened okay? Nothing's going to happen to the baby."

Claire looked down and nodded, she handed the child over to Brian who took him in his arms. He looked so small. He gazed at Claire's worried face and smiled, to show her everything was fine. And once again he wondered, what happened to her.

--

Shannon hugged Rosalie again and looked at her.

"You're standing!" she said tearfully and then hugged Rosalie again. "How… you are standing!"

Rosalie grinned and embraced her friend. "Yes, yes I am!"

"That's totally crazy!"

Rosalie laughed. She didn't really want to sit down, not after she finally could walk again but she did feel tired. They sat down beside each other on a blanket and Shannon looked at her.

"How?" she breathed.

"I don't know. I heard Claire cry in the jungle and next thing I know I delivered a baby and regained the control of my legs."

"That's so…"

"Amazing?"

"… crazy. Good crazy. You can finally walk! Oh, we should totally check out that waterfall some of the guys found! And we can swim! And take walks! Oh! We can set Boone's tent on fire!"

Rosalie laughed but then Shannon frowned.

"What is it?"

"Bonne's not back yet. Margo and Dom are not back yet too."

Rosalie put a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sure they will be back safely. I came back right?"

Shannon nodded. "Yeah, you did."

--

"Jack – where are you going?" Kate asked him and grabbed his arm, forcing him to stop.

"To the hatch."

"Why? What about the whole speech about waiting here until the sun –"

"Sometimes you tell people lies Kate. I assume you know a lot about that."

She stared at him and shook her head. "I don't know what's going on with you Jack."

She left him and went back into the cave. He gazed after her. Regret showing in his face.

"Going on another top secret mission?"

Jack swung around and saw Wendy. She looked at him with raised eyebrows.

"I'm just –"

"I'm just coming along, let's go!" she said and took him by the arm and they walked into the jungle.

----

Cassie stared at the half-naked man in her hallway. Lori smirked. Cassie gaped, and then she grabbed the man and then threw him out of their apartment and closed the door quickly.

"You forgot to give him his pants back," said Lorraine with a grin.

"What was his name?" Cassie's tone was cold.

Lori shrugged. "Ryan, Rey or something. I know you are rolling your eyes!"

"You can't keep doing this!" Cassie said frantic and grabbed Lori's arm. "Bringing home random people all the time –"

"Of course I can. Just did." Lori pulled her arm free and walked past Cassie to take on her shoes.

"Where are you going?"

Lori sighed. "What are you my mom?"

Cassie took a deep breath. "Lori, please I'm your friend."

"Yes, not my mom so stop being so damn –"

"I'm worried about you."

Lori halted by the door and turned around. "Worried about me? You are the one who has a boyfriend who cheats on you!"

"What?" Cassie whimpered.

"I forgot to tell you that? Too bad."

Lori closed the door behind her.

----

Rose sat down next to Zidler. He was playing around with a twig in the dying fire and looked miserable.

"Oh, hey Rose," he said without any joy.

"Now why are you so sad?" she asked. "Claire has returned. Healthy and with a child. Rosalie and Brian are here too."

"Not Margo," Zidler reminded her. "She's probably hurt, dead or something."

"Are you sure about that Montgomery?"

Zidler growled at the use of his real name and didn't answer her.

"Do you feel that she's in danger?"

He looked up. "What do you mean?"

"I feel it," she pointed to her heart, "here, that my husband's alive. Well, I am not sure if he's fine. But I know he is alive. Do you feel that Margo really is in trouble?"

Zidler looked down and broke the twig in the middle.

"I don't feel anything."

--

"So… how do we get down there?"

Jack didn't answer her. He tied the cable around a tree and then around himself.

"Hey, how about me?"

"I'll go down first."

"So that means that if there's a monster hungry for some Doctor meat you'll get eaten first."

"That's right," he said and smiled.

"Oh, okay then," she breathed.

"Here," Jack said and handed her his gun.

"Um, are you sure?"

"Yes." She accepted it, she didn't tell him what happened the last time someone gave her a gun.

Jack went down the hatch. She stood a bit away; she didn't want to watch him disappear into the dark. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah… I'm at the bottom. And no monster as far as I can see."

"I'm coming after you…" Wendy wasn't really sure how. She was terrified, she dragged the rope up, looked at it. "Now what?"

--

Bonnie didn't get any sleep. Sean, Sawyer and Allen had all shrugged it away as her imagination. But she had seen something awful, terrible. She couldn't tell herself she had been hallucinating because it had been so real. She buried her face closer in the blanket, she had seen _it_.

She had seen her daughter, cold, lifeless, dead.

She could also shrug it off as a lie, as something she thought she had seen, but she knew. It wasn't a hunch, it wasn't a guess. She knew her daughter's life had stopped. That she would never see her again.

She felt pain, but not the pain you got when you had lost a child. Because there was this little chance, which she felt in her heart, that little glimpse of hope that she was wrong. That was what kept her going.

She wanted to go back. It wasn't to warn or to comfort the people at the caves. It was for her own reasons; she needed to speak to Rosalie. She was the only one who would ever understand.

"Rise and shine sunshine!"

Bonnie took a deep breath and sat up; she glanced hastily at Sawyer before she grabbed her backpack. Now, they were finally going back.

--

Dom blinked.

His back was aching and he felt like he had rolled around in mud and then eaten it. He felt awful. He sat up, looked around and saw the daylight reach through the branches. He blinked again.

And then everything that happened the night before came back to him.

He looked to his side where Margo lay. She muttered a swear word and opened her eyes. She mumbled a 'what' and then her eyes widened too.

"Um… hey."

"Oh God," she sat up to and rubbed her head.

"I know, I'm amazing," he joked. Margo glared.

Dom guessed she wasn't used to be hangover. Or maybe she wasn't used to be hangover on an island in the middle of nowhere after she had slept with a criminal. Or maybe that was the turn on.

"Did we…?"

Dom frowned. "Yes we did. I'm offended you don't remember."

"Well after you got me drunk –"

"I got you drunk? You were practically all over me!"

"I was not! You were the one who kissed me!"

"I remember the night before better than you do and it was you who kissed me!"

"No I didn't!"

"Yes you did!"

"No I didn't!"

"Yes you did!"

Margo stared at him and then kicked his leg. He winced.

"Put some pants on," she growled.

--

Claire looked down at her son. _Her_ son. She was the one who gave birth to him; she was the one who was supposed to protect him. She knew that now, when she looked at him, felt him in her arms. She wasn't going to let anyone take him away from her.

"You want to tell us what happened?"

She glanced at Charlie. "Where's Jack?"

"He headed back to the hatch…"

Claire bit her lip. She wanted to tell everyone, she didn't want to repeat her story. Not that it was a long one.

"Hey," Brian pulled her face to his, Charlie glared, "you can tell us and then we can tell the others if that's okay?"

Claire nodded.

"I was… I was at this… station," she looked down at her son. "It's all a bit blurry, they kept me drugged. Ethan was there though. I remember that he – he took care of me. They, they wanted to have the baby. That was why they took me. They wanted him."

Brian squeezed her hand and she glanced thankful at him. "I don't remember how I escaped. I… I think one of them helped me because I remember this face, a girl, she said she would help me and then I was out in the jungle again. I didn't know where I was and I was so, so scared… that's when Rosalie found me."

Brian looked around at the survivors reactions. They all seemed shocked, afraid. But it was Owen's face that caught his eye. It was grim; she was looking directly into Claire's eyes.

And she nodded slightly.

--

Lori swore as Michael shouted that he saw the island.

"I agree with you," said Michael and gazed at the island. "I never wanted to see this rock ever again."

The sun started to go up on the sky. Even though it was bitter as hell that they were going back right where they started Lori felt a little joy that they weren't going to burn to death underneath the hot sun.

Jin said something in Korean. Lori patted him on the back and winced as she hurt her shoulder.

"I'll try to take it out."

"Why thank you Mike but since you're floating on another piece of junk I'll just stay right here thanks."

Michael rolled his eyes and prepared himself to jump in the ocean.

"Seriously," Lori snorted when he swam through the waves, "men."

Michael grabbed the planks and the little space Jin and Lori sat on rocked worriedly. He heaved himself up and Lori heard a creaking sound, if Michael was the reason she died she would torture him in hell.

"Give me your arm," he said.

"I would but then I would only have one…. What are you going to do, take the bullet out with your bare hands?"

"You got a better idea?"

Lori opened her mouth but then Michael touched her shoulder and she cried out in agony.

----

"By the way," she told the man she was flirting with at the bar, "your mother says hi."

"But my mother is dead."

"I know."

Lori gave the bartender her cash and left. She turned right and her feet brought her forward, she knew where she was going even though she couldn't see. She knew the smell, how the ground felt underneath her feet. How many steps she would take before she had to turn left. She knew all of that.

"Hello Hume. What do you want today?" Will the cashier said when she walked into the store. Lori swallowed.

"A pregnancy test."

She heard something fall to the floor and break. "Oh."

She paid him and he didn't say anything, just handed over the test to her and watched after her as she left. Heart beating hard in her chest.

She walked up the stairs and counted the levels until she knew she was outside her own apartment. She took out her keys and opened it, kicked off her shoes, the pregnancy test clenched hard in her hand.

Before she walked to the bathroom she checked her missed calls while she took off her jacket.

"Hi Lori, it's Penny. You know the lead I thought I had? Turns out it was nothing. I'm sorry. I won't stop looking after your brother though. Take care love."

"Lori, it's me, Cassie. I didn't leave a note since I know you can't read it. You will notice soon anyway. I moved out while you were away at that camping trip. I took your drugs too by the way. I'm sorry it had to come to this. But you need to stop! Okay, I'm still your friend, but after you slept with Stephen… he was my boyfriend! I know you are upset about your brother but –"

Lori deleted her message.

----

Brian looked through the journal again. The same words over and over and they never made sense to him. It was a stubborn thought that he, if he read the words enough times would magically understand them. Locke was at the hatch probably, maybe he could go there. But what Jack said about it being nothing. He felt a lump in his throat. Was all they did for nothing? Boone was still gone and worry started to nag his mind, maybe he should look after him.

He took up the compass and measured it. Still it didn't point north. He traced his finger along the engraved letters D A, wondered what it meant.

"Where's my son?"

He looked to his side where Claire lay, she had fallen asleep once again and her beautiful blue eyes looked up and met his.

"Owen got him. As you said you wanted her too… still are you sure you want her to take care of him?"

Claire smiled and looked down. "I trust her," she said in her hoarse voice.

Brian didn't know how anyone could trust Owen.

"What's that?" she asked and pulled herself up in a sitting position and nodded at the journal.

"It's just something Locke and Boone found. Some ramblings and such."

"Do you know where my diary is?"

_Yes, right here by my side_. "No, not really."

She nodded solemnly.

--

Wendy reached the bottom of the hatch with a thud. She released herself from the cable and swore as she stepped on a mirror on the ground. It cracked with a horrid sound. Her pulse fastened as she walked through and came out on hard solid floor.

There were several paths. It was like a maze. She chose a direction and started to walk quietly, gun in her hands. She tried to breathe slowly to calm herself down. Suddenly the fillings in her teeth started to hurt and she took another path and was faced with a big mural painted on the wall.

It was haunted. She stared at it. Distorted faces, numbers, a polar bear. She took a deep breath but felt tears well up in her eyes of fear.

She jumped and yelled in shock when music started to bang loud. She looked around for the source and swung around.

_But you've gotta make your own kind of music…_

She took left and kept herself close against the wall, she stepped into a big round room. Several of computer equipment was set around the room.

_Sing your own special song…_

She walked up to the computer in the centre. She looked at the button called 'execute', she touched the keyboard…

_Make your own kind of music…_

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

_Even if nobody else sings along…_

"Locke?"

"Hello Wendy," he said calmly.

The situation felt tense and Wendy still held the gun in the air. "Where are Jack and Fox? What is all of this?"

"Drop your gun."

Wendy hesitated, but something felt wrong. "No."

"Wendy, please drop your gun."

"Where's Fox?" she asked.

"Drop the gun or I'll blow his brains out sister!"

Wendy stared and saw a gun held to Locke's head and a man that stood slightly behind him.

"Move and I will kill him. Put the gun down!"

Wendy gaped but tried to regain control. "Where are they Locke?"

"Wendy it's okay."

"I said drop it!"

"Where are they?"

"They are fine, do as he says…"

"No, where are –"

The man fired the gun above her head and Wendy jumped, she held the gun tighter but was shaking with fear.

"Lower the gun or I'll blow his damn head off!"

She saw his face.

"Are you… Desmond Hume?"

--

"So we never speak of it again?"

"Okay."

"Okay!"

"Fine."

"Fine!"

They made their way through the jungle. Margo threw a glare at him once or twice but Dom didn't care. They both felt awful. Not really about what they had done, but about the fact that they both winced every time the sun hit their face.

They had both made it clear to the other that they didn't like each other in that… way. At least they had listed a number of reasons why they shouldn't. But they both agreed that what happened wouldn't change a thing.

Margo let out a bitter cheer as they reached the caves; he went in after her and was greeted by solemn welcomes. Zidler looked up and started to jump on the spot, it looked like half of his body wanted to stay on the spot and the other one wanted to go and hug Margo. The other one won and he ran up and embraced her tightly. Margo patted him on the back as he talked really fast.

"If you stop talking and get me some water I'll forgive you," she said.

She pulled away from the hug and Zidler looked at Dom and realized they had returned, together.

"We were out looking for dynamite," said Margo quickly, they met each other's gaze.

"Dom!"

He was pulled into a bone-crushing hug by Kay and then she hit him on the arm. "Where the hell were you?" she barked.

"Uh…" he looked at Margo again, "looking for dynamite."

"So what happened here? Everyone looks happier!" Margo tried to get their attention.

Zidler looked suspicious and Kay's eyes narrowed.

Maybe it had changed something.

--

"Desmond Hume?" Wendy whispered and stared at the man.

Then several things happened at once.

A shot was fired at the man and Locke, Locke fell to the ground and the man fired his gun towards Wendy. Wendy ducked and the bullet went straight through the computer. Jack came out from one of the passageways, face grim as he hit the man hard with his gun.

"What have you done?" the man cried and stood up. He rushed to the broken computer. "What have you done? We're all going to die."

Fox climbed down from the vent and into the room, he stared at the crying man.

"We're all going to die!"

----

Negative said Cassie.

Awesome. She should celebrate. Maybe get drunk.

Instead, she cried. She sobbed in her hands and rocked back and forth on the bathroom floor. Cassie didn't know what do. Finally she put her arms around her friend and sobbed with her. Lori wanted to hit her, hurt at least something, but she pulled her closer. Clinging onto her best friend while the tears ran down her face.

After what felt like hours. Cassie pulled away, said something about making tea and left Lori alone. She stood up and leaned against the wall, brushed her tears away. It was stupid to cry. She didn't want to be a mom. She had been doing drugs; the kid could turn out sick because of her! So it was good, that she wasn't pregnant, wasn't it?

"Which date is it?" Cassie shouted from the kitchen. Lori gasped as she remembered.

She ran out of the bathroom, took on her shoes and ran out of the apartment. Leaving a stunned Cassie behind.

----

"So everyone's back except for Boone?"

"Who?" Dom asked Kay and she rolled her eyes.

"Locke and Fox stayed at the hatch, and Hurley said Jack went there too."

"But there's not enough space to hide anyone in it?"

Kate nodded. "I think it's safe to return to the beach now."

"Okay, I'll go get my things," Kay stood up and walked away. Dom gazed after her. Kate hit him on the arm.

"Why's everyone hitting me?" he whined.

"You slept with Margo!" she whispered harshly.

Dom stared. "How…"

"I'm your sister. I know stuff. It's a gift and a curse. How could you?"

"I don't think it's any of your business who –"

"How could you do that to Kay?"

"Kay?"

"Yes."

"Um… what?"

"Am I going to have to make a slideshow for you to understand?"

"Still… what?"

"Never mind. You both will figure it out. Hopefully sometime this century."

They had a staring contest for a minute then Kate finally let out a little smile. She couldn't stay mad at her brother for too long.

"There's something else too," she said, "I think we got a Jack problem".

"A Jack problem?"

Kate nodded. "He saw my mug shot Dom. He knows I'm a fugitive."

"Will he do something about it?"

"I don't know. He hasn't told anyone about it yet… but, what if he does?"

"Then we'll take care of him."

--

Michael fell down on the sand, he was soaking wet and the sand hurt his skin. He groaned of exhaustion and pulled himself up, he glanced to his left. Jin was helping Lori who didn't want his help and it was a small entertainment to watch them struggle out of the water.

"Ugh," Lori growled and came up to him, "this is the last time I'll trust any of your constructions."

"Excuse me for not making the raft explosion-proof."

"Something to think about next time, eh?"

"Udders!" Jin suddenly shouted.

"What?" he asked in a hurried voice.

"Udders!"

He turned around and a sharp wooden stick hit his head and he fell to the ground. Lori screamed, he tried to stand up but was hit down again. Jin shouted something in Korean. The last thing he saw was Lori, as she, despite being blind and exhausted kicked a blonde girl in her stomach.

----

"Congratulations to Desmond David Hume!"

She was sitting in a narrow alley. Garbage cans everywhere and something that looked like a dead cat. The ground was filthy and the brick wall she leaned on was sprayed with paint. Heroin, alcohol and pills laid by her side. She took a sip of the drink and put a pill in her mouth, then another one.

"Died in the sea!"

She took another sip, two more pills followed. A rat sneaked between two empty cans.

"Left his sister all alone!"

She grabbed the heroin. Someone looked in from the street and then hurried on its pace.

"And his wife to be!"

----

**Author's Notes: ** Admit it, I'm Batman.

Somehow I manage to keep NaNoWriMo, school work and this story alive. Thank the swine flu for that! And no, I don't have it. It's the vaccine that's making me sick but at least I can write with my hand… sort of.

It was Claire at the end of the other chapter, don't fret! It will be explained as everything else. But think like this: Rousseau came in season 1 and talked about the sickness. Season 5 we saw it. So don't expect any huge revelations too soon.

You guys leave the most awesome reviews, thank you all! There's nothing that makes me happier than to read what you have to say. Thanks!

I hate the quadrangle in the show, so to make a new one is sort of weird. But I decided after the first chapter exactly who were going to be in the love… quadrangle, triangle, a shape with six sides (I'm Swedish I don't know every English geometrical word!), so there you have it.

Namaste.


	17. Fading Away

_Or if an hour with calmer wing  
Its down did on my spirit fling,  
That little hour with lyre and rhyme  
To while away-forbidden thing!  
My heart half fear'd to be a crime  
Unless it trembled with the string._

But now my soul hath too much room-  
Gone are the glory and the gloom-  
The black hath mellow'd into grey,  
And all the fires are fading away.

_- Romance by Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 15, Fading Away**

--

"We're all going to die!"

She was staring at the man as he touched the broken computer with his hands. Wendy had dropped the gun on the ground, her hands covered her mouth and she was simply in shock. Jack was by Locke's side and she had no idea what was going on.

"I have to fix it!" Desmond shouted, alone in his world, frantically examining the computer. "I have to fix it!"

"Locke!" Jack shouted. Desmond was still talking to himself. Fox was stammering. It all was a frantic turmoil in her head and she couldn't stand it anymore.

"SHUT UP!" she roared and tears sprung from her eyes in frustration. "SHUT THE HELL UP!"

They went silent, even Desmond. "What is going on?" asked Wendy.

Desmond spoke up first and spoke directly to Wendy. "Look at the wall. You see that? That's a timer. It's counting down. I've got to enter the code. I've got to push the button."

Wendy followed his gaze, there was a timer above the entrance she had come from, she saw it count down. "Or what?" she asked him, tried to steady her voice.

"Or else we're all going to die."

"Jack, stop pointing the gun at him," said Locke from the floor.

"Since you are shot in the leg Locke I don't think you have much to say." Jack obviously didn't believe any of it. Although Locke, while bleeding out on the floor seemed determined in the belief that the man, Desmond was right.

Wendy chose a side. "What can we do to fix it?"

--

There's no place like home.

Rosalie took off her shoes when the jungle stopped and they came out at the camp. She enjoyed the feeling of sand underneath her bare feet and smiled happily when she gazed out on the blue waves, today, she could actually swim in the sea for the first time.

Claret shivered, it wasn't cold. It was a hot day and the sun blazed. But she felt cold. She always did that now. She had this aching secret inside of her. She remembered Sayid's closed eyes and when Owen told her to just leave him, no burial, nothing in the jungle. It nagged her mind. She couldn't help but make up imaginary scenarios with Sayid coming out from the trees. Blaming eyes and the chanting of cold blooded murder.

Claire, with the help of Brian and Owen set up her tent. Well, it was Brian and Owen who did that. She sat next to them and held her son in her arms, looked down at him and smiled. Was it possible to burst from love? She loved him so much. And she was more afraid than she had ever been in her life, she was afraid that her son would get sick, that he would hate her, that he would get hurt in his life, that he would get taken – that she would get taken again.

Margo drank more of the water and gazed over at Dom, he and Kaylee had somehow managed to bring their whole tent down and were now happily laughing while they tried to set it up again. She felt something in her stomach. It was probably just that weird fruit she ate earlier.

"I'm going to take a walk," Rosalie told Shannon and Shannon nodded distantly; she kept her gaze on the forest.

Rosalie held up her skirt with her hands as she walked through the water. She picked up small shells in her hand and dropped them again. Touched her lips and tasted the wonderful salt. Everything was more beautiful. She had never really appreciated the beach and the island before.

Suddenly she saw something, in the distant, something green. It was a bottle. She hurried on her pace, her skirt got wet by the high waves and she stumbled upon it and took it up in her hands. No, it couldn't be.

It was the bottle with the messages.

--

Michael groaned and sat up slowly. He blinked and looked around.

"Howdy Mike!" said Lori. "Nice of you to join us."

Michael swore. They were inside a pit. Earth surrounded them and above the top was covered. He stared at Jin and Lori. They both were dirty and Lori had blue bruises all over her arms. Michael could only wonder how horrid he looked himself.

"What – what happened?"

"Those others kicked our asses and threw us down here," Lori explained and made big arm gestures. "I think I did manage to kick one of their asses too…"

"Did you see Walt?" He already knew the answer. Somehow he just knew.

"Jin said 'no Walt' all the time so I don't think he saw him at least," she answered coolly.

"What about Flor?"

"I didn't hear her voice. And that loud cheerleader voice is hard to miss."

Michael stood up and glanced up at the cover above them. "When are we going to get food?" he asked.

--

Brian left Owen and Claire chatting by Claire's tent and walked over to Shannon, she was simply standing in the sand with her eyes turned to the jungle. Her hair was uncombed, tangled and frizzy ran down her on her shoulders. She had stains on her blouse and skirt, all of them had. But Shannon always used to change her clothes and wash them; she didn't want to look like all of them.

"You said he left you," Shannon whispered and he was startled. He didn't know she knew he was standing behind her, "to get Jack right? When Claire was giving birth?"

He didn't have to ask who he was. "Yes. He was supposed to bring the dynamite too…"

"So he could've blown up?" Shannon's voice got higher and she turned her head at him. Her eyes desperate, pleading.

Somehow, that thought hadn't crossed Brian's mind and he gaped at her. "He could have."

They both wandered off in their thought of _Boone bits_ scattered in the jungle. Brian shuddered.

"I mean… he's probably okay," he said after a while. "He might just be at the caves… or the hatch."

"The hatch?" Shannon said in revelation. "Then we should go there! To see if he's okay…"

Brian nodded and suddenly Shannon smiled. "I'll just go and change to a better outfit first and then we'll leave!"

Shannon's idea of a better outfit was something that probably was illegal in some states, not that Brian was complaining.

----

_Hey this is Aiden. Leave a message after the beep… or not. See you._

_Beep._

"Hey bro."

Her voice was hoarser than she intended. She held the phone close to her ear with both her hands. Clinging onto it while she tried to get out what she wanted to say through her dry lips.

"It's… it's me. I'm calling you again to tell you I'm still safe and sound."

She should stop there. She was only supposed call him now and then to tell him she was fine, safe and okay. But this was different. She took a deep breath, dried the tears that welled up in her eyes.

"I'm in Iowa. I'm going to be here for a while."

She watched the motel door. She was scared, that someone would barge through the door this moment – right now. She snuggled closer to the wall behind the uncomfortable bed, as if she would be safer that way.

Kaylee's lips shivered as she spoke. "I would like to see you."

----

"Let's take a break!"

"Yippee," Sawyer said without any joy and sat down.

Bonnie took off her backpack and sat down beside Allen, out of ear-shot from Sawyer and Sean. She offered him her water bottle, since Sawyer still had his.

"Thanks," he said and smiled.

"So what do you mean with that you've seen _things_ in the jungle before?" Bonnie asked and picked up their conversation again.

Allen swallowed the water. "You know, things… people, that aren't supposed to be here. At first I thought it was just a hallucination but… I found things."

"That was… cryptic."

Allen chuckled. "Yeah, I guess. But what I mean is that what we saw – it wasn't necessarily Walt."

"What else could it be?" she asked.

"You said you saw black smoke. A black smoke that made you _see_ things."

"Yeah what's your – oh."

"Yeah." He took another sip of the water and leaned back against the tree.

"But still – what if it was Walt?"

"Then we are in a lot of trouble," Allan joked.

Bonnie nodded. "I think we should try to find him."

"Excuse me… what?"

"Find him, find Walt. If it was him then he's all alone in the jungle – freaked out and scared. Then we need to find him!"

Allen stared at her. "You know this is madness right?"

"Screw madness!"

"From the very true words from our true friend the psychopath," Sawyer showed up behind Bonnie and put his hands on her shoulder. She shrugged him off and turned to Allen.

"So what do you say? We go find him?"

"What… now?"

"What… what?" asked Sawyer, wanting to be included in their conversation.

Bonnie rolled her eyes. "Yes now!"

"What are you and Cowboy here talking about?"

"All right," Allen finally said. Bonnie smiled brightly and turned around to face Sawyer.

"We're going on another suicidal mission."

"You are what?"

--

"They are coming!"

Michael looked up and saw that the cover was lifted but bright sunlight was all he saw until a girl was thrown down, she had her face in the dirt and the cover was closed again.

"Hey, hey are you okay?" Michael touched the woman's cheek but she quickly slapped his hand away and stood up against the wall, staring at them scared. She had brilliant blue eyes and blonde hair that fell down her back, there was a pale scar underneath her left eye and she had a fresh bruise around her other.

"Who are you?" she asked, it looked as if she wanted to sink into the earth and disappear.

"We crashed here. We were on a plane. Sydney to Los Angeles," Lori told her, measuring the girl with her eyes. Her voice was more mature than her looks, it felt misplaced to her.

"What?" the girl squeaked.

"We survived. About forty of us –"

"Flight 815?"

Michael stared at her surprised. "You were on it too?"

"Yes," she said and her eyes shone, "Yes I was – I was in the back and when the plane broke off something hit me - I woke up on a beach –"

"You mean you have been out here, alone this whole time?" Lori couldn't believe what she was hearing. The girl nodded eagerly.

"I've been trying to survive – and yesterday, yesterday they…" she looked up, "yesterday they found me."

"Do you know who they are?" Michael asked.

The girl shook her head. "You tell me."

"Have you seen a boy? He's about ten years old? They took my son."

"No… no, I'm sorry. I'm Andrea," she said.

"I'm Michael, this is Jin… he doesn't speak English and this is –"

"Lori," she said and interrupted him. She looked at Andrea through narrow eyes. "So you have been living here, all alone, living on mangos and bananas?"

The girl nodded slowly and avoided Lori's gaze.

"Hmm."

--

What should she do?

Who could she show it to?

She couldn't tell Sun, she couldn't burden the woman with the fact that her husband might be in danger. But still, didn't she deserve the truth? Rosalie thought back at the time when Sun thought she'd lost her husband, no, she wasn't going to destroy hope by a guess. She didn't know if something had gone wrong, the bottle could've fallen off, they could all be okay.

Or they were in terrible danger.

Shannon was nowhere to be seen, Jack – she thought of Claret and shrugged the thought away. Jack had gone mad and Claret had enough of pain already. Bonnie, Sawyer, they were both away. Claire was happy with a newborn child and who was she to take that happiness away? But who could she trust with it? Herself of course, but for how long could she keep it to herself without bursting?

All right, she hadn't had it for that long. But she needed to tell someone.

So when Kaylee Evans walked by the tree Rosalie was hiding behind she grabbed her and pulled her into the jungle with her. Kay let out a yell and saw that it was just Rosalie.

"Why'd you do that for?" she whined. Rosalie regretted her decision but she had to tell someone.

"I found the bottle with the messages," she said quickly and held the bottle out. Kay stared at it.

"Oh," she said slowly. "Wait… does that mean they're… what does this mean? How…"

"I found it washed up ashore… I didn't know what to do."

"It doesn't mean anything right?" Kay said, and her voice was exactly as stressed as Rosalie's. "It could've just fallen off… it doesn't mean they're… they're…" her voice choked up.

"We're just overreacting."

"Yeah… overreacting."

"No need to tell anyone… about this."

"Yeah, yeah no need."

"So let's not do that okay?"

They looked at each other.

"Want to see what everyone wrote?" Kay asked.

----

"Where'd you get that?"

"You don't want to know," Dom said cheerfully. Kay smiled and raised her eyebrows.

"Dom, a motorbike?"

"What? I needed something to cheer me up."

Kay's smile faltered a little. They'd come to Iowa, Kate and Dom had heard of their mother's sickness, cancer and without saying a word they'd turned the car right around to go back. Kate had gone to visit her old friend Tom Brennan, a doctor who would maybe be able to help Dom and Kate visit their mother – for one last time.

"It's nice."

"Nice? Kaylee, this baby is beautiful."

Kay laughed.

That night, she took the keys to the motorbike and sneaked out of their motel room. She left Dom without a word.

----

After what felt like hours of arguing, but probably just was a few minutes, Sean had convinced Sawyer that shooting Bonnie and Allen in the leg was not going to help them – and he should just let them go.

Sean sighed of relief when Bonnie and Al disappeared into the deep jungle and Sawyer hadn't pulled the trigger. He turned around to go back – and noticed that Sawyer wasn't following him.

"Are you coming or not?" Sean asked him, Sawyer had a frown on his face and it looked like he was fighting an inner battle.

"Yeah, yeah," he muttered. Sean suddenly smiled.

"You know, you can go with them if you want to."

"Why would I want to go searching after little hallucination Tarzan?"

"I'm not saying you do. But if you want to, I can watch over Rosalie and make sure to shoot anyone who upsets her."

"Oh yeah?"

He would never admit it. Sean knew that. So he swung around and left hastily into the jungle, and Sawyer, didn't follow him this time either.

--

"I'm not climbing down that."

After much unnecessary arguing, they were finally at the bottom of the hatch. Shannon kept close to him but hissed at him from time to time so he wouldn't forget she thought he was an idiot. Brian walked towards the noise and soon he and Shannon were standing at the entrance of a very weird looking room, full with computers and technology stuff that looked like they were from a science-fiction movie.

"Hi," Brian said awkwardly.

Wendy jumped and hit her head in the table and swore in Spanish. Brian looked at the man at her side, he'd never seen him before. Fox seemed to be hammering on a computer and there was blood on the floor. Brian never thought he would see a freakier scene than Claire giving birth, but this definitely was among the top ten freaky situations in his life.

"Who are they?" the man shouted and pointed a finger at them. He looked panicked. Sweat ran down his face and his accent was Scottish.

Wendy stared at them. "Two people we didn't really need right now."

--

Kay and Dom were cutting fruit. How that could be so absolutely hilarious Zidler had no idea. But Kay kept giggling and Dom looked at her like he had never seen a girl before in his life. Margo kept glaring at them while cutting her own piece of mango, and Zidler was afraid she was going to cut off one of her fingers soon as she kept her gaze on them. She mumbled something about how Kay wasn't that pretty, something about how it looked like she was fading away and how ridiculous it all was.

"So," he said and cleared his throat, "too bad you guys were out all night searching for dynamite while the A-team already had it right? Waste of time."

Margo continued to stare at Dom and Kay while muttering.

"But at least you weren't alone right?"

Kay fed Dom a piece of the mango, Dom laughed. Margo mumbled an okay to him.

"Are you listening to me?"

Dom had a smudge of fruit on his cheek; Kay touched his face to remove it.

"By the way Margo, I found this really cool alien spaceship to take us off the island, what do you say we leave in one hour?"

She mumbled a sure.

Zidler wondered if he should hang himself or let his broken heart slowly kill him.

----

The pub was crowded. There was a game on and drinks passed around as the people roared or clapped their hands at the players on the screen. Kaylee gazed up at it and saw one of the players score; she assumed that it was a bad thing since the whole pub let out an angry growl together.

She made her way past a red-faced man that had obviously got too much to drink and her gaze trailed across the room. Searching after someone. The smell of alcohol tickling her nose.

Then she saw him. He sat alone by a table in a corner. A beer in front of him and he had his arms crossed. His black hair was cut short – instead of that long thing he got before and his face was paler than the last time she'd seen him, the freckles were faint but his eyes were still as green as hers.

"Hey Aiden," she greeted her brother and he looked up. Saw her and for one moment his face split up into a smile and he reached out his hands – almost as to hug her, then, he let them fall to his sides and his face turned grim.

"Kaylee Ann Evans," he said in a cold voice. "You got a lot to explain."

----

"Okay, so this is how we roll. Jin, you play dead."

"Dead?" he repeated.

"Yeah, lay on the ground like a dog. Sit! And you Andy call for help."

"Sick prisoner? Really? How's that going to help us –"

Lori showed her the gun and smirked. Andrea frowned and looked at Lori's eyes.

"Oh, you are blind."

Michael froze and Jin gaped, even he understood that Andrea had said something incredibly offensive. Lori took a deep breath and put a cold hand on Andrea's shoulder.

"So?" she said and Andrea started to stammer.

"Michael," Lori said, "you take care of the gun?"

Michael nodded and reached out a hand to take it. Suddenly Andrea elbowed him. Grabbed the gun and swung it at Jin.

"Back up! I said back up!"

Michael eyes were wide and Jin held his hands up in the air as she backed away from them.

"I'm coming out!" she shouted.

The cover over the prison was lifted and the sun blazed over them. A rope was lowered down and Andrea, still holding the gun got pulled up by it.

"Who are they Andy?" they heard a voice ask before the cover was closed again.

--

"Sean!" Sean said to himself. "Nice to have you back!"

He was slightly disappointed by the lack of enthusiasm of his return. But people were gone and back every day it seemed, so he didn't take too much offense. He gave Hurley a quick recap of what happened, leaving out the part about Walt and trusted Hurley to have spread the word before the evening came. He looked out at the sea, and wondered once again if everything was all right out there in the world, if a certain someone was alright.

He was expecting some rest, maybe some food and cold water. But he barely made it to his tent before Brian ambushed him and told him quickly about the hatch and how he needed to be there.

Would there ever be one moment of peace?

--

"Fruit?"

Rosalie watched Kaylee with narrow eyes. Kay stood awkwardly on the spot until she dropped her hand and blushed slightly. "Sorry."

"For what?" Rosalie asked coolly. She wiggled her toes again and felt the waves down then sink back again on her feet. It was a lovely feeling.

"For wanting to read the letters."

"It's okay to be curious. Trying to claw the bottle out of my hands is a different thing."

Kay was even redder in her face and she let her hair fall into her face to hide it. Like she was before all the running. The shy, sweet girl. She wasn't that anymore. Or maybe she was, a little, deep inside, someone she didn't like to let out. "I'm sorry, really Rosalie I am. I just…" _Went crazy because I thought Dom would write something about me. _

"I believe you are." And the frightening look Rosalie gave her was replaced with a sweet one and Kay relaxed a little. "I'm thinking about burying it."

"Bury it?"

Rosalie nodded. "I think it's the best for now. In that way everyone's secrets will be kept safe and we'll still have hope."

"Okay. That sounds like a good idea – could I just… I wrote a letter. Can I have it back?"

Rosalie's lips tightened but she reached to her side and gave Kay the bottle. Watched her with suspicion and Kay knew she was going to attack her if she tried to read someone else's letter. She found a wrinkled piece of paper and clutched it hard in her hand. "Thank you," she said. Rosalie smiled.

----

"I don't believe you."

His words were like a slap to her face. She shunned away from him and spilled out a little of her drink on the table. Behind her the people let out a cry of happiness, someone must've scored a goal.

"Ai - Aiden…"

He shook his head. "I'm sorry Kay. But I don't believe you."

"Please Aiden… it's what happened I…"

"No it didn't." He met her gaze. "I was living in the same home as you Kay. I didn't see anything, neither did our mother, don't you think we would've noticed if Peter was taking - advantage of you?"

"He did, Aiden I promise he did –"

"You always hated him Kay. You were so childish all the time. Nagging and telling lies about him – I never thought you would kill him."

Kay was crying. "No…" she whispered.

"Why can't you just turn yourself in?"

"No!" she slammed her hand on the table. She was mad. "Don't you dare! You have no idea… I thought you would understand! You're my brother Aiden, my own brother. And you don't believe me." She shook her head in disbelief and stood up. "I'm leaving tomorrow. I won't call you anymore… just promise not to turn me in?"

His voice was choked. "You are still my sister… but you are also a murderer Kaylee. No matter the reasons, you are and always will be a killer."

----

"So there's been this guy... Desmond you said? Living right underneath our feet this whole time?"

"Yup."

"And he's been pushing a button every 108 minutes for three years otherwise the world would end?"

"Yup."

"And now the computer he used to push the button is broken and you want _me_ to fix it?"

"I'm going to say yup again."

"That's crazy," Sean declared. "Absolutely insane."

"Like that mural," Brian said and pointed.

Sean shook his head in disbelief and Brian led him into a big round room. Old fashioned computers and equipments were placed by the walls and he stared up over the entrance at the timer counting down, then at the broken computer.

"I could fix it," he said.

"You could?" A man emerged from the other entrance and Sean felt like he'd seen the man before, but couldn't quite place him. He guessed this was Desmond.

"Yes, if I were back at civilization with the right tools and a couple of more engineers – sure."

The man looked frantic at him. "You need to fix it!" Behind him Wendy came up, she looked relieved for a second when she saw Sean.

"I'm sorry – I don't think I can…"

"You don't bloody understand! None of you do!"

"That the world's going to end?" Shannon joined the group and she frowned. "Yeah totally."

Desmond looked around at them all, desperate for someone to believe him. "The turn of the screw," he said in a whisper.

"What?" Sean asked.

"The turn of the screw – it's a book. Look behind it."

Wendy looked confused when Desmond rushed into the other room. Sean and Brian followed after him and he found himself in a room with dark walls, bookshelves, a table and a sofa. He swallowed and tried to take it all in without going crazy.

"Here… here it is!" Desmond grabbed a book from the shelf and behind it Sean saw an old tape, the man turned to him and handed him it. Excitement showing in his sweaty face. "Watch it."

--

"Maybe we can make a human pyramid. Michael can I climb up on your shoulders?"

Michael ignored Lori. "We have to get out somehow, my son is out there –"

"I know. So about this human pyramid…" her voice trailed off as the cover of the pit was opened again. A dark man looked down at them; beside him Andrea stood. She threw down a rope.

"Grab the rope!" she shouted.

"Never," Lori said. Andrea cocked the gun.

"I wasn't talking to you _Lori_, grab the rope Jin!"

Michael looked at Jin and nodded. Jin took the rope and got pulled out of the pit.

"You too Mike."

Michael scowled at the fact that his nickname was carrying on but grabbed the rope too and joined Jin at the top. Andrea gazed down.

"I'm never coming with you!" Lori shouted. "I don't care what you –"

Andrea closed the cover and she was hidden in darkness again.

--

"_Welcome, I'm Dr. Marvin Candle, and this is the orientation film for Station 3 of the DHARMA Initiative. In a moment you'll be given a simple set of instructions for how you and your partner will fulfill the responsibilities associated with the station. But first, a little history."_

Fox and Sean managed to set up the video equipment and Wendy had asked the hysterical Desmond five times if there were any popcorn, irritatingly enough, she had to watch the film without it. Jack had attended to Locke's leg and Locke was now standing on crutches and watched the film with a gleam in his eye.

"_The DHARMA Initiative was created in 1970, and it is the brainchild of Gerald and Karen DeGroot - two doctoral candidates at the University of Michigan. Following in the footsteps of visionaries such as B.F. Skinner" _

The movie was old, well it was from the seventies of course. The screen flickered and sometimes there was just static. But Wendy watched with eerily fascination at it.

"_Imagined a large scale communal research compound where scientists and free thinkers from around the globe could pursue research in meteorology, psychology, parapsychology, zoology, electromagnetism, and Utopian social - Danish industrialist and munitions magnate Alvar Hanso whose financial backing made their dream of a multi-purpose social science research facility a reality."_

"That's some wacko stuff," Wendy said and Shannon agreed.

"_You and your partner are currently located in Station 3, or the Swan, and will be for the next 540 days. The Station 3 was originally constructed as a laboratory where scientists could work to understand the unique electromagnetic fluctuations emanating from this sector of the island."_

"Unique electro what?" Brian asked and Wendy hushed him, even though she'd been talking just a while before. She looked to her side, at the tunnel leading out. Desmond had a bag and he was packing things in it, a book – a picture…

"_Not long after the experiments began, however, there was an incident. And since that time the following protocol has been observed: every 108 minutes the button must be pushed. From the moment the alarm sounds you will have 4 minutes to enter the code into the microcomputer processor…"_

The screen flickered again. Wendy silently stood up and sneaked out of the room and saw Desmond zipping the bag up.

"What are you doing?" she hissed.

"Leaving," Desmond said.

"What… wait, no!" Desmond was already walking away from her and she hurried after him. "No, you can't leave… "

"…_Induction into the program. When the alarm sounds, either you or your partner must input the code. It is highly recommended that you and your partner take alternating shifts. In this manner you will stay as fresh and alert… utmost importance that when the alarm sounds the code be entered correctly, and in a timely fashion. Do not attempt to use the computer for anything."_

"Desmond, there's so many questions… why hasn't anyone come for you? Why… what was the incident, why does it say 'quarantine'… Desmond!"

There was a door and Wendy stared surprised at it. Desmond opened it slowly and then looked at her.

"See you in another life yeah?" he said and left.

"_Congratulations, until your replacements arrive, the future of the project is in your hands. On behalf of the DeGroots, Alvar Hanso and all of us at the DHARMA Initiative, thank you. Namaste. And good luck."_

Brian took a deep breath. "Well that was…"

"Where are Desmond and Wendy?" Shannon asked.

--

"This is a good spot."

"Yes it is."

The waves from the ocean were calmer. The sun was not as hot and blazing. They were quite far away from the camp and the sand looked untouched and the trees far away, it was serene, beautiful.

Rosalie and Kay dug with their hands in the ground. The sand was easy to get away and soon the bottle was covered again. Rosalie patted the sand one last time and looked at Kaylee.

"Rosalie," Kay said with a small voice. "What do you think happened?"

"I had a dream."

"Oh." Kay was a bit surprised at her answer.

"I saw the raft, devour in flames, my daughter was on it and I was at the shore, too far away to save her. So I walked on the water, but when I reached her it was too late."

Kay didn't really know what to say to that. She looked down at the sand and fingered above the place they buried the bottle with messages.

"I think it means that I'm going to see her again. But that it will take a long time. That's also what I think of rescue. I think it will come, but before that – we'll all go through a lot, bad and good things. But that still one day, it will come."

Kay sighed. "I don't know if I want it to come."

----

Tom helped them. Dom and Kate had both stared at her like she was crazy when she said she would stay behind. They didn't know what she'd done the night before. The three of them had gone into the hospital, past security, all of them wanted for murder. Tom left them as they all entered the room were Diane lay.

"It's me… It's me Katie."

"Katherine? Dominic?"

Kate and Dom nodded together, Kay had never seen them so vulnerable before. It felt private. Like they'd stripped off everything and she could see right into their hearts. But she couldn't look away. Diane was pale, sick, dying.

"Mom, I'm so sorry." Dom said tearfully. Kay blinked.

Kate swallowed. "I'm sorry for everything we put you through."

"Help," Diane whispered, and Kate looked confused at her mother.

"It's… it's okay Mom, it's just us. Your children."

"Help, help."

"It's us Mom…"

"HELP! Somebody help me!"

Kate and Dom looked at each other. Horror showing in both their faces. Dom took Kay's hand and they pushed the doors opened.

"What's going on?" There stood a security guard; he held a walkie-talkie in his hand and looked at them suspiciously.

"I'm her daughter," Kate said quickly. "She's confused, I was going to get a doctor."

"Hang on." He grabbed Kate's shoulder and put the walkie-talkie to his mouth. "We've got Kate Austen and –"

Dom grabbed the walkie-talkie. Slammed it over the man's head. Kay stared stunned and the man fell to the floor.

"Let's go!"

They ran through the corridors, and Kay didn't know where they were running. But Dom's was holding her hand in a tight grip and Kate ran before them. They came out on a parking lot beneath the hospital, Tom was walking to car. He turned around and stared at them.

"What the –"

Kate grabbed the car keys from his hand. "Thanks."

He tried to get into the car but Kate hit the pedal and the car went forward. Dom sat in the front seat and Kay sat in the back. A small toy airplane by her side.

"How did they know?" Kate asked.

"Look out!" Dom shouted. A police car blocked the exit. Kate didn't stop but went right through the blockade. Kay looked back and saw the officer pull out a gun.

"I don't know!" she yelled.

PANG!

The glass shattered and rained down on Kaylee. Dom looked at her terrified, but saw that she was okay. "I don't know." Kay said again.

"WATCH OUT!"

Smoke, fire. They'd crashed into another car. Kay coughed. Felt blood in her mouth. Two strong arms pulled her out of the car. Dom held her. She heard the sirens.

"We have to get out of here," Dom said. And the three of them ran, once again.

----

After what felt like hours Lori heard the cover getting open again. She was resting against the wall, sitting on the dirt. Her head ached and she was thirsty for water.

"You want to come too?" Andrea's chirpy voice said.

"What are you going to do?"

"Eat your brains!" a cheerful voice shouted but she couldn't see who it belonged to.

"Keep quiet! Andrea hissed and threw down the rope once again. "Grab it!"

Lori did as she said. She took the rope with both her hands and prayed that she made the right decision.

--

"Do – do you believe it?" Fox asked Sean and helped him hold up the computer.

"No, not really."

Locke and Jack watched from afar. Shannon was watching the video again, nagging about the bad quality while chewing on an 'Apollo' candy bar they found in a storage room. Brian had left. He said that if the world was ending he rather spend his last minutes with someone else.

"This is what I was talking about Jack," Locke told him.

Jack turned to him. "What do you mean Locke?"

"This – saving the world. It was as I said. All roads lead here."

Jack huffed."Saving the world?"

"Yes Jack. We are all here for a reason."

"And you think this is yours?"

Locke met his eyes and smiled. "Yes I do. But not only mine. Brian – he was at the edge of death, and now he's walking, breathing. And why? Because the island, the island wanted him alive."

"I would say you are delirious from your wound, but you are not. Locke, there is no such thing as destiny. An island can't choose who lives or dies. That's crazy."

"Over forty people surviving a plane crash and landing on an island with vicious natives and a hatch that has a button that needs to be pushed to save the world is too crazy to be a coincidence Jack. Why can't you see it?"

"I… I think I fixed it." Sean interrupted their argument.

"That soon?"

"Well I am quite the genius."

There the computer was. The green blinking. It worked. The timer counted down once again.

"What's the code?" Sean asked.

--

"Desmond!"

"I thought I lost you by the red stones."

"Almost did."

Wendy stood on the top of the slope and gazed down at Desmond.

"Why are you running?" she asked. She was tired, sweaty and angry but when she spoke her voice was small and fragile.

"Because sister, if the world ends I don't want to be around to see it. Oh, I guess you want the code."

"The – the code?"

"Listen carefully. If the computer starts working again… 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42, and then press execute. Remember, 4, 8, 15 –"

"Shut up!"

Desmond silenced.

"What if it's all a lie? What if we push the button and it resets but what if we don't and NOTHING happens?" Wendy yelled.

"Maybe you are right. But what if you're not?"

"Shut up," Wendy said again and she was trembling with anger. "I know who you are, Desmond Hume right? I heard you died in a sailing race around the world. And yet here you are, on this bloody island! THREE YEARS. And now you're saying that there always has to be someone here, to push the button – why, why can't we just leave?" Tears ran down Wendy's face and she walked down to Desmond and faced him. "Why are we here?"

"I'm sorry sister, I don't know."

And he left. Darted into the jungle and Wendy, dried away the tears and took a deep breath.

"By the way," she said out into the jungle in a whisper. She knew he couldn't hear her. "Your girlfriend is looking after you and she says hi."

--

"Michael?"

"Right here Lori. And Jin too."

"So have you all had a nice little chat?"

"Yes actually we did. They have explained it all to us. They are survivors from the back part of the plane. They've been out here, surviving like us. They believe us too."

"Then I guess we all can sue Oceanic together?"

"I like her," a voice sang and Andrea hissed again.

"How many of you survived?" Lori asked them as they started to trek through the jungle.

"Twenty-three of us." It was an unknown woman's voice, young but determined.

"I'm Lori," she said.

She could her that the woman was glad when she talked. "I'm Kimika."

"And I'm –"

It sounded as if the girl had been silenced again. Whoever it was she wasn't supposed to be talking. She walked closer to Michael and whispered, so that no one else could hear.

"Describe everything… please."

--

"Hey, what are you doing?"

Claire looked up and saw Brian stand beside her. He sat down and looked at the piece of paper in her hand.

"I'm looking through suggestions of baby names," she told him with a smile, "Margo and Zidler gave me this list…"

Brian read out loud from it: "Zidler, Zid, Montgomery, Monty, Morgan, Margo and Zidargo?"

"Yeah I think I'll rather choose Owen's suggestions than theirs."

Brian chuckled. "I think Zidargo is quite a dashing name… So how are you holding up?"

"As good as you can be I guess," Claire said a bit solemnly but tried to get her smile back again. "How's it going for you guys and the hatch? You are spending an awful lot time there for nothing."

"Well… it's a bunker. But it's nice to have a real roof over your head."

It was lame. He knew that and the look Claire gave him showed that she clearly didn't believe him. But she was willing to let it go.

"Do you have any name ideas for the baby?"

"I always thought Brian was a great name."

She laughed.

--

The alarm rang in her ears. An annoying ringing sound and she closed her eyes hard and leaned against the wall. Breathe. Remember to breathe.

Wendy opened them again and walked into the room. Jack and Locke were arguing, Fox stood in a corner and looked depressed. Sean was standing in front of the computer, staring at it with intent eyes.

* * *

They all turned to her and she walked up to the computer and hit the tangents.

"4," she said and hit the number. "8," she hit another one. "15, 16, 23 and…"

"42," Fox whispered.

She hit the execute button.

They went silent and watched the timer reset.

--

When Kay returned at the beach again, Kate and Dom immediately grabbed her and dragged her away once again to a secluded area of the beach.

"So," Dom said and glanced at his sister.

"We've talked."

"And talked."

"And talked some more…"

"And after that we also talked."

"Yeah, I get it. You talked." Kay gave them an encouraging look.

"Jack saw Kate's mug shot," Dom said and looked cautious at Kaylee.

"What? You talked… when did this happen?"

Kate looked alarmed. "It was Dom who didn't want to tell you!" she said quickly and Dom considered smashing the half mango he had in his hand in her face. He looked regretfully at Kay.

Kay raised her eyebrows. "Why?"

"I'll leave you two to it." Kate said and patted Dom on the back, a smug look on her face before she skipped, actually _skipped_ away from them. He was so going to get back at her later.

"What's your reason?" Kay asked.

"I'm… pretty?"

"Seriously."

"You've gone through a lot Kay. More than I can imagine. You've been put through so many things - I didn't want to burden you more okay?" He waited for her to hit him, kick him or something.

Instead, Kay smiled. The jungle must have made her crazy. "That's sweet."

"What?"

"That you care for me."

This conversation was talking a weird turn. "So you're not going to hit me?"

She hit him on the arm. Not that hard though.

----

"_Hello?"_

"Aiden William Evans?"

"_Yes – yes that's me."_

"I know what you did."

"_Who – who is this?"_

"I know what you did to your sister."

Silence, a cough at the other end of the line.

"_I… I don't know what you're talking about…"_

"Your sister. Kaylee Evans."

"_I… I don't have a sister."_

"Don't lie."

"_What do you want?"_

"I know that you called the cops on her back in Iowa."

A nervous chuckle. That bastard.

"_Who is this again?" _

"I'm the one who's going to put a bullet through your head."

"_What – what?"_

"Do you hear me? If you as much as talk to Kaylee again or try to find her on your own or sell her out I'll blow your brains out. Won't that look good on a picture to show to your wife and kids?"

"_Who…"_

"Are you stupid or something? All right, have you seen that scene in _'I know what you did last summer'_ with the guy in the trunk?"

"_Ye – yes."_

"Then you know what's going to happen to you. If you ever, ever do something to hurt Kaylee again."

Dom shut the phone. Call disconnected. He was awesome.

----

Michael was met by the other survivors. There was Andrea, she seemed like the leader. She could be mistaken as a child from distance but when she spoke it was with confidence. She was walking closely with a dark man, Eko his name was, he held a stick in his hand and there was something about him that made Michael realize that this man was wise. Kim was the nicest of them all, she smiled and didn't seem to have the same hostility as Andrea and the man Eko. She had long, straight black hair and an Asian look to her. There was also this little girl, but Andrea kept close to her and refused to let her say anything.

"We are here," Kim said. To Michael it looked like the middle of nowhere. Then she pulled away some tangled wines and leaves and he saw a door. She knocked and it was opened an old man with white hair. His eyes widened at the sight of them.

"We'll explain everything inside," Andrea said quickly and brushed past the man. Michael followed after Lori in. It was a bunker. There was a big logo painted on the grey walls and there were torches on fire inside to keep it bright.

Michael looked around; he saw a couple of people and someone who lay on the ground. "I thought you said there were twenty-three of you?" he asked Kim.

Kim met his eyes. "There were."

"Michael!" Jin pointed at the person on the floor and Michael stared in surprise.

"Boone?"

--

**Author's Notes:** NaNoWriMo is officially killing me. Eat and sleep? I have a vague memory of once doing that…

Thank you guys; you are the most awesome, awesome people on the planet. Seriously, you are. I wish I could give you cookies, if I could I would! Thank you all. Please review!


	18. Mortals

The night, though clear, shall frown,  
And the stars shall not look down  
From their high thrones in the Heaven  
With light like hope to mortals given,

_But their red orbs, without beam,  
To thy weariness shall seem  
As a burning and a fever  
Which would cling to thee for ever._

- Spirits of the Dead by Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 16, Mortals**

--

Andrea watched Boone slowly die before her eyes. The shot itself hadn't been deadly. They'd taken him with them, carried him to the hidden station. He'd been fine. Well, as fine as he could be with a gun wound in his leg. But then the infection took over and he was feverish, sick, delirious. None of them had felt too much guilt over it, but now he had turned out to be another survivor and she blamed herself more and more.

Even though it wasn't she who fired the gun.

She gazed across the bunker. She saw them, those other survivors. They sat close to each other. The blind chick, the Korean guy and then Michael – the man who lost his son. They had a camp. They were so many more than them.

She saw Ana-Lucia staring suspiciously at them, holding Ellie's hand to make sure she wouldn't go talk to them. By the guy, Boone's side Libby sat. Bathing his hot forehead. Andrea was the one who used to do that. After all she was the real doctor. But they didn't have the resources to save him so she stopped trying.

Kim walked over to the girl Lori's side. Offered her a fruit. She smiled, her eyes shone while the other ones couldn't see. She saw Lori ease up, getting more relaxed as Kim chatted away. Always so sweet, so innocent.

It was Kim who pulled the trigger.

"Listen up!"

Ana-Lucia let out a huff. She and Andrea didn't get along, mostly because they were both sort of fighting for the leadership. But Ana had made many mistakes, Kim was one of them.

"We're leaving for their camp. First we got to gather food. Are anyone of you up for catching fish?"

Jin smiled.

----

"Hey, it's me your lovely sister. Just calling to make sure you haven't thrown yourself off a bridge – don't do that by the way! Just… wondering how things are and such. We haven't talked in a while and I was getting worried. So, hmm, life's good… My work is okay except for the total jerk who calls himself a surgeon. And I'm pregnant. So now you got to return my call! Bye!"

Andy turned off her cell phone and was delighted when a couple of seconds later it rang.

"Andrea Widmore," she answered calmly.

"_PREGNANT?"_

"Calm down Penny." Andy laughed. "I'm not pregnant."

"_You aren't? Andrea why would you bloody say that then?"_

"So that you would call!" Andy crossed the street carefully. Here in Sydney people seemed to get run over by cars more often than in other places. "Otherwise it takes weeks for you to respond."

"_Yes… I'm sorry about that. I've been busy."_

Andy frowned and almost walked into lamppost. "Busy with what?" she asked and walked around it.

"_Work stuff."_

"Penny you don't got a job." Andy slid out her keys and walked up the many stairs to her apartment. Like it had been for years the elevator was out of function.

"… _Andy, I have to go. I'll talk to you later love?"_

Andy dropped her keys on the floor and picked them up again. Penny always did that. "Sure," she muttered and didn't even have the time to say goodbye before Penny hung up. Now annoyed she stepped into her apartment and took off her shoes.

"The shoes are supposed to be on the mat!"

Andy's super annoying hypochondriac and cleaning freak of a roommate (also called Will) quickly moved her shoes onto the red mat. Andy moved them back on the floor.

Instead of freaking out and screaming about germs, Will looked concerned and put a hand on her shoulder. "Bad day?"

Will was the most irritating germ-scared person Andy had ever met in her whole life. But he sure knew how to make the best tea in the universe.

He sat down beside her on their dust free and unreasonably sterile couch. "So why so broody?"

"I think my sister's hiding something from me." Andy took a sip of the hot tea, it burned her tongue.

"Which is not that unusual since she's on the other side of the planet."

Andy glared at him. "You don't understand. We tell each other everything."

"You mean she knows about the one-night stand you had with that hot receptionist at your hospital?"

"Yup."

"Scary."

"Indeed," someone said behind them. Will turned around and gave his boyfriend a quick kiss. Andy rolled her eyes. For someone so bacteria-phobic like Will she was surprised he even dared to hold hands with someone like Greg.

"You know that it's not normal to give your three-week long boyfriend a key to the apartment?"

"Shut up," Greg called from the kitchen. Andy shook her head and slumped back into the couch again.

"So back to the whole sister issues thing," Will said cheerfully. Andy snorted.

"You know her boyfriend…"

"He who's missing?"

Andy nodded and took a sip out of the tea. "She promised me she wouldn't look after him."

Concern passed Will's face. "So?"

"I think she is looking after him after all."

----

After several hours in the jungle having to listen to Sawyer and Bonnie flirt madly without doing something about it – Allen was glad for any interruption, even if it meant getting chased through the jungle by an unseen monster.

No matter how many times Sawyer shouted 'son of a bitch' and fired his gun their unseen predator stopped. Trees got drawn up from their roots and fell in front of him. He jumped over a fallen tree and heard Bonnie shout something behind him. He rushed into a couple of bamboo trees and looked desperately around to see Sawyer or Bonnie. But he couldn't see them anywhere. But he heard Bonnie scream.

_Click. Click. _

The clashing noise was similar, he'd almost forgotten it but now the memory was fresh of the first night after the plane crash, it was this. This was the monster.

He didn't dare to scream. Just shivered and closed his hands around the bamboo to hold himself up on his feet. He saw something, like smoke or a shadow and then the noises faded away until he could breathe again. He still didn't dare to shout but took one careful step out, then another one until he was running again.

"Damn." It was Bonnie's backpack. Up in a tree. He saw a horrid image of what could've happened to Bonnie. Body broken and blood and – no, he couldn't think that way.

"Sawyer!" he finally shouted. "Bo – Bonnie?"

"Right here Scruffy."

Al hugged Bonnie. Sawyer pretended to look offended that he didn't receive a hug.

"What the _hell_ was that?"

Bonnie stared at him and then looked at Sawyer, her eyes big. "I think it was what I saw back at the beach. I think it was the black smoke."

--

Jin was surprisingly good at catching fish. Andrea liked him. He didn't talk much and when he did she didn't understand. It was easy to like such a person.

When they returned there was a fight going on. It seemed like Michael was trying to kill Eko with his eyes and Lori was trying to strangle him at the same time.

"You are not leaving," Eko repeated.

"I have to go after my son!" Michael yelled. "Libby here said they came from there –" He waved with his hands at the jungle, "- I'm going and you can't stop me!"

"Wanna bet?" Ana-Lucia growled.

"I don't understand you people! Many of you have gotten taken too right? I mean –" He turned to Lori. "What about Flor huh? And those kids you were talking about?"

"We'd all like to go." Andrea joined the discussion. "But it is suicide, we have a – a sick man with us!"

"I'm going." Michael began to make his way to the jungle.

Ana-Lucia pulled out her gun and Michael froze. But not because of the gun pointing at his back.

A woman gracefully jumped down in front of him from a tree. Her skin was dark and her eyes even darker. Her long curly hair was pulled back into a ponytail. Her entire appearance showed confidence, and when the others looked worn out by the many days on the Island she glowed of strength.

Michael immediately took a step back but the woman took a step forward. Her eyes storming in rage.

"It's stupid," she said and her tone told them she'd heard every single word of their conversation. "Suicidal to go into the jungle alone. You will not help your son in any way. Do you think you and a simple knife will be able to hunt these people down? Because if you do be my guest. The last thing we need is an idiot holding us back. We have _all _lost people. But leave, if you think that's the right thing to do."

Michael looked stunned and the woman took a step to the side. Confused he gawked at her.

"Put down the gun Ana," Lalita, the woman, said in a calm voice and Michael slipped past her, he stopped as to say something but then he shook his head and disappeared into the deep, green jungle.

----

"Please, I'm just looking after my friend."

The hot receptionist guy – Cameron looked stressed as the blonde girl leaning over the desk began to talk in a more and more high-pitched tone.

"I'm sorry miss, uh…"

"It's Cassie! Can't you just look?"

Cameron's eye begged Andy to help him. All she did was to throw him a blinding smile as she walked down the hospital's corridor on her way out.

The girl continued to squeak. "I just want to know if Lori is –"

The doors closed behind her and she breathed in the fresh air. It had been a stressful day. Mothers and father always were overly concerned about their children and nagged her for hours about their children's weird coughing patterns. Though she was glad that there were parents that actually cared for their offspring in this world.

She walked towards her car and turned on her cell phone. She had many missing calls, two from Will and the other ones from Penny. Immediately she put the phone to her ear and waited impatiently for her sister to pick up.

"_Lori?"_

She laughed with relief. "Penny are you all right?"

"_Yes I'm fine. I tried to reach you but –"_

"What is it?"

"_Our father, he…"_

"What did he do this time?" Andy growled. She had very little respect for their father.

"_I think he knows where Desmond is."_

Andy suddenly felt how all the blood rushed off her cheeks and she felt cold. "Penelope," she said calmly even though she wanted to scream, "you got to stop with this obsession."

"_It's not an obsession Andy!"_

"Yes it is!" she shouted back. "I know you are hurt and I know you miss him but Penny – he is gone. He's dead."

"_I cannot believe you said that."_

She hung up the phone and Andy quickly dried the tears away with her sleeve before she looked after the keys to her car.

She swore. They were gone.

----

"Have you named him?" Claret asked and gazed down at the boy in the – the only word for it was cradle. It was something the survivors had made out of different pieces of debris and looked like something that came out from the set of Star Wars.

Claire shook her head. "I want to choose the perfect name. Something that's really special." She took a bottle of water that Owen had given her and drank.

"Yeah," Owen agreed. Even though Claire had turned down the suggestions of Spock, Hulk and Owen's name herself. "You can't choose something boring and usual like Simon or Aaron or…"

Claire's eyes widened and she spit out the water. "Aaron!"

"Yes horrid name isn't it?"

"No, it's absolutely wonderful!" Both Claire and Claret looked down adoringly at the child now called Aaron.

Owen stared at them. "Didn't you hear what I just said?"

--

Fox wrote down the numbers on a note and put in beside the computer. He stared at them for a while. Zoomed out from the noises around him as he wandered away in thought. But a loud yell from Wendy made him wake up and he saw them stand in the entrance, Jack, Wendy and Locke.

"You're not our leader anymore Jack!" Wendy yelled and stormed off. Locke looked down as to say he was sorry before he followed her through the tunnel. Jack sighed and rubbed his head like he had a headache.

"You – ok- okay?"

Jack looked at him and nodded. "Yeah, yeah."

"What was that about?"

Jack sighed again. "Locke… decided to tell everyone at the beach about what the hatch _really_ is."

"Oh…"

"And I disagree."

Fox waited for Jack to explain why. But he just looked exhausted leaning against the wall. It looked like he hadn't slept in days.

"I ca – can take the fir – first shift."

Jack didn't really show the gratitude he expected. He just nodded again, mumbled something incoherent and went off to the next room. Fox looked at the timer.

Maybe he could read a book to pass the time.

--

Andrea knew they were impatient to return. But they needed more food for the journey. She had rather done it with Kim, but somehow Lori felt like she needed to prove herself and tagged along to into the jungle to pick fruit.

"So, Lori," Kim said and tried to break the ice. "Any cute guys on the other side of the Island?"

Andrea blinked up from the tree. Cute guys? That was the priority of questions? She closed her mouth. She needed to calm down. She was too tense. What had happened to her? She was right up in a tree expecting an attack, her whole body ready to fight just in case.

"I don't know about looks," Lori said and Kim looked embarrassed and started to mumble an apology. "But I guess some of them are not complete idiots. Like… uh, the stuttering guy… Fox!"

Andrea decided to ruin the girl talk. "You haven't had too many problems with the others? I thought you mentioned you captured one?"

"Two actually." Lori packed down the coconuts. "Didn't get much out of them though."

"What happened to them?" Kim asked.

"One of them got shot in the head and the other one ran off."

The trip back to the group was awkward.

----

"Okay, no tissues on the floor!"

"Can't you just look away from that and focus on the fact that your best friend and awesome roommate is dying?"

Will rolled his eyes and carefully made his way to the other side of Andy's bed. He looked like he was arguing with himself before he swallowed down all his fears and climbed up in the bed beside her.

"No hug?" Andy asked tearfully.

"You got a runny nose."

Andy sniffed and pulled the covers further up and felt sorry for herself.

"Andy this isn't like you to behave this way."

"Then how do I behave?"

"Not even after you break up with someone you lock yourself in the room and eat tons of ice-cream, you usually laugh and throw a party. And now when you have had an argument with your sister you act like the world is ending!"

"She never wants to talk with me again!" Andy whined.

"_Now everyone report to the dance floor. To the dance floor, to the dance floor. Now everyone report to the dance floor…"_

Andy quickly jumped off the bed and grabbed her cell phone from her nightstand. Will's face showed that he clearly disagree with her choice of ring signal.

"Penny?" Andy breathed into the phone.

"_Actually it's Karen."_

"Ka – Karen? Oh, it's been such a long time since we last talked. How are you? Are you crying?"

"_Oh Andy, it's my father. He's dying."_

----

Shannon was sunbathing. Always a pleasure for the eye. She wore a small bikini and her mouth was shut. That was the Shannon he liked.

"Hey."

Shannon made a rude hand gesture. She had made it clear that she thought it was Brian's fault that Boone wasn't at the hatch. The only good thing about it was that she now had a stash of candy bars.

"Shannon," Brian said as Shannon took a bite out of the chocolate. "Is that bikini smaller than before or are you just getting bigger?"

Shannon glared and put the bar away. Brian grabbed it.

"What do you want Haligan?" she asked and rolled over so her back was against the sun.

"No one's interested on going off in another search-party after Boone. They think he's on vacation or something."

"So?"

"We know he isn't. We should look after him."

"Whatever you may think about me - I'm not interested of going into the jungle with creepy kidnappers and, well, look at you."

"I do look at myself. It always makes me smile."

Shannon rolled her eyes and Brian stood up. "I just thought you would care a bit about your brother. Prove him wrong."

"Prove him wrong about what?"

"That you aren't useless." Brian waved with the candy bar and walked down the beach.

--

Wendy watched as Locke told everyone about the hatch. The reactions were very different, for some the hatch inspired hope, for others it was just crazy.

She didn't feel comfortable around anyone for the moment. They all tried to ask her questions she didn't want to answer. She pushed her way through the jungle and felt utterly hopeless. The conversation with Desmond had just sucked out every single last glint of hope she had and she felt like a shell of her former self. But when she saw him, Karl she relaxed just a little. She watched his cute, innocent face as he grinned when she sat down by the ashes of an old fire in the jungle.

"Glad you came," he said. "Rabbit?"

Wendy shook her head and wondered how he got a hold of one.

"We went into the hatch," she told him silently.

His eyes narrowed and she knew it was because she was so quiet. "Yeah I know."

"Is it true?"

Karl looked up. "What's true?"

"The hatch, the button, the 108 minutes…"

"I…" Karl looked down again at the piece of meat. "I don't know."

Wendy bit her lip and stared at him. She wanted him to say something. "You're lying. Why? You are not with them anymore. You don't need to lie to me."

Karl sighed. "Yes I do."

"_Why?"_

"Because I'm going back."

Wendy stared at him. "What?"

He looked shameful. "I'm going back. I have to. There's someone –"

"Someone?"

He hesitated. "I'm leaving."

"Well – you can't! You said so yourself - you said so!"

"Things change. Next time you come I won't be here."

"And what if I stay?"

He chuckled. "You won't."

--

Lalita seemed to have a great impact on the other survivors. They were afraid of Eko. They loathed Andrea herself. They thought Kim was sweet and the little girl Ellie even cuter. But Lalita, they saw as the real leader figure.

And maybe Lalita could have been the leader of them, if she hadn't gone through everything she did. Because they had all lost, but she had lost the one she loved the most. And that made them all frightened of her. And also made them trust her unconditionally.

Kim tried to keep the mood up, Ellie too despite Ana-Lucia's efforts to keep the girl quiet. They all loved Ellie, but Ana took care of Ellie like no other. But she didn't have children of her own. Kim had asked.

Jin was broody; Andy guessed he wasn't happy about his friend leaving. Neither was Lori.

"Why do we take this way?" Lori suddenly asked and interrupted Kim's ramblings about ice-cream.

Andrea looked over her shoulder at the girl. "What do you mean?"

"We are walking in circles sometimes, turning left and then completely changing the direction. Like a zigzag."

Andy tried to keep her surprise low. The girl was blind, but… She knew more than they did about what they were doing.

"We're walking this way so that _they _won't follow us."

"They are already here," Lori whispered.

Jin reacted first and pushed Kim underneath a small slope and Ana and Ellie followed quickly. Lalita dragged down the stunned Libby then she immediately disappeared up in a tree and Andy grabbed Lori's hand and pulled her down. Trying not to breathe too loud. Eko and Bernard carried the stretcher down carefully.

All they could see were feet. Andy could feel the blind girl's frustration next to her, not to be able to know what was going on. Andy saw the dirty, bare feet of the Others. But she didn't see their faces.

Soon the steps of the natives faded away and Lalita climbed down from the tree. Jin looked surprised at the woman's climbing abilities but Andy was more surprised at Lori's ability to hear.

"Did you see Michael?"

Libby turned to Lori. "All we saw were feet."

"We should go after them, find Michael we should –"

"Should what Lori?" Andrea snapped.

"We got a gun!"

"One gun ain't going to stop them." Ana-Lucia's voice was harsh. "They're smart, and they're animals, and they could be anywhere at any time. You heard them. Now we're moving through the jungle - their jungle - just so you can save your friend over here. So shut your mouth and keep moving."

Lori didn't protest more and once again they moved through the jungle.

----

"Bye!"

Will hugged her one last time and Greg gave her a pat on the shoulder before she entered the airport. Her friend Karen had called from Los Angeles and begged Andy to come because her father was dying. Andy wanted to be there to help her.

Now she was watching a clock ticking, waiting for the time her plane would arrive. She looked around and saw a bar. It was empty but a man in a suit. She made her way through the crowd to it, she sat down.

"Why were you yelling?"

The man at her side turned to her, looking confused.

Andy smiled. "You were yelling at the girl in the check-in counter."

"Do – do I know you?"

"We're on the same flight, 815? So your Dad died here in Sydney right?"

He smiled back. "I thought you didn't know why I was yelling?"

"Right," Andy smiled shyly.

"Yeah, my Dad died, heart attack."

"I'm sorry." She turned to the bartender. "Can I get a tequila and tonic please?"

The man looked into her eyes. "I'm Jack," he said.

"Andrea." She got the drink and held it in her hands.

"So, Andrea. Any reason for drinking a tequila and tonic at ten to noon?"

"I hate flying," she answered simply. "It's the worst thing ever. I always think I'm going to crash."

"_Now everyone report to the dance floor. To the dance floor, to the dance floor."_

Andy blushed. "Sorry, got to take this call." She stood up.

Jack chuckled. "We'll have the next drink on the plane right?"

Andy smiled again. "Sure."

She walked away from him and found a place where the noises from the people weren't as loud.

"Hello Andrea here."

"_Andy? It's me…"_

----

"Cool hatch." Owen looked around admiringly. "Where's the giant bomb?"

Fox frowned. "Giant bo - bomb?" he asked from the couch. He dropped the book as he nervously watched Owen.

"The bomb that's supposed to blow up the world! There got to be a bomb!"

"Sorry, no - no bomb."

The alarm got off and Owen yelled in surprise at the loud ringing noise. Fox stood up and rushed into the room with the computer. Owen followed him and watched over his shoulder as he typed in the numbers. 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42.

He pressed execute and turned to Owen. Her eyes were wide and she looked slightly taken off guard.

"You – you okay?"

Owen shrugged. "Yeah, yeah, sure. I'm okay. So, uh, I guess I'll take the next shift?"

"Actually I have the next shift."

"Hi Jack," Owen greeted him. "You look terrible."

"I'm alright."

"And doctors are supposed to be smart." Owen walked over to him and took his arm and looked him in the eye. "You don't only look awful Jack. I assure you I know that you are feeling awful too. I'll take this shift and you can go back to the beach."

And for once, Jack actually listened. After ten minutes of further arguments at least.

--

"Rosalie!" Shannon rushed over at Rosalie's side by the tent. "You have to help me pack!"

Rosalie frowned. "For what?" She stood up and Shannon grabbed one of the bigger bags – which was Rosalie's bag.

"Brian and I are going to search after Boone tomorrow." Shannon looked at a violet blouse. "Do you think I should bring this one along or the pink one?"

Rosalie took rudely the clothing from Shannon's hands. "You and Brian?" She didn't mean to sound so harsh, but she couldn't help but feel the stress rise inside her chest.

"Yes, what's the problem with that?"

There were a lot of things that were a problem. Number one, Shannon going on a search party! She couldn't stomp off into the jungle. That wasn't Shannon. She could die of a mosquito bite or she would accidentally mistake a boar for an ape or -

"Are you sure you want to go, Brian can surely go by himself."

"Yes but I want too." Shannon looked at her and saw her worried expression. "I'm going to be okay you know?"

Rosalie knew how awful it felt when people you loved didn't believe in you. So she swallowed down the words that she wanted to say and managed a smile. "Of course. It's just a lot of things going on you know?"

Shannon relaxed. "Yeah. So… the purple or the pink one?"

--

"All right. We've been walking through this jungle a long time and there's still no sign of Kazoo yet so what do you say we head back to the nice comfy beach?"

"Nope." Bonnie grinned. They'd been doing the same conversation for what felt like a century only with different words and more touching and flirty remarks. Allen had shouted 'get a room!' possibly a hundred times. His voice was getting hoarse.

"Shush!"

"Shush what?" Bonnie whispered and stopped. Al carefully walked forward towards the sound of the whimpering. Sawyer's eyes widened as he heard them too.

A net hung in the air from a tree. It rocked slightly back and forth as the prisoner in it moved. It was a man and when he met Allen's eyes he saw that he had intense blue eyes that stared right at him.

"Please!" the man shouted and he tried to reach out for them with his hand. "Please help me!"

--

"What are you reading?"

Dom watched Margo as she sat down beside him on the blanket outside his tent. Her light brown hair fell freely over her shoulders and Dom found himself thinking she looked really pretty that way.

Dom tried to hide his awkwardness with a blinding grin. "Some sort of comic book Hurley borrowed me. It's in Spanish."

Margo almost looked shy. "You know Spanish?"

"Nope. But don't tell anyone. Chicks dig the whole brains thing."

Margo giggled and Dom's smile grew wider. "See, it's already working."

"So…" Margo said and looked shyly at him. "What do you think of the whole hatch thing?"

"I don't know. Sounds too much like a Captain Nemo construction to me. But really, what are the odds of us crashing on an Island with the power to end the world?"

Margo nodded. "Yeah. I mean, there are only like twelve Islands like that in the whole world."

Dom began to read his comic book again. He was glad they had overcome the awkward stage… sort of. He looked up and saw Zidler crossing the beach in front of them, _again_.

"Um…"

"What?" Margo asked.

"Either Zidler has started to work out, which I doubt but it's kind of weird he just keeps walking across the beach and glancing at us all the time."

"Oh I didn't notice." Margo frowned.

"Didn't you guys always stick together like conjoined twins or something?"

Margo's eyes grew distant and suddenly Dom saw how pale she really was, even her freckles seemed lighter. "Yeah… I guess I haven't talked to him for a while…" she mumbled.

"Margo, are you alright?"

"No… actually I kind of feel a little dizzy." Margo stood up on her feet. "I'm going to bed… uh, my patch of sand where I sleep."

"Goodnight then."

"Goodnight."

--

Owen found that there were laundry automats in the hatch.

To do laundry.

It was very strange.

She stepped out of the shower. It had been nice to have shampoo again and she felt refreshed as she put on her brown pants and big yellow t-shirt. She should wash them too, but it was her shift and she didn't have time to go back to the beach and get new clothes.

Fox was sleeping in the bunk bed and she was disappointed that she couldn't listen to all the records she'd found, instead she decided to explore the hatch further.

She walked across the tunnel where the deep hatch entrance laid, they used the door now. It was ironic; Locke and Brian had spent a long time trying to open that thing when there was a functioning door not too far away.

A small humming noise seemed to come from one of the walls and when she walked past it her necklace got drawn towards it. In shock she saw it dangle in the air, reaching out to the wall.

"Freaky."

"Owen?"

Owen almost fell backwards of surprise. "You should wear a bell Fox."

"What's tha – that?"

"That is my necklace being strangely attracted to the wall." Owen took a step back and Fox took a step forward. Inspecting the wall closely.

"I wonder what's be – behind that wa – wall."

"What do you say we try to find out?"

--

"Margo, why are you lying in my tent?"

"It's my tent," Margo mumbled and pulled the blanket over her head. Someone pulled it down and she looked up at Rosalie.

"Honey this is _my_ tent."'

"Oh," Margo said and sat up. "I… I must have walked wrong…"

Rosalie looked at Margo closely, she was worried. "Are you feeling well?"

Margo's gaze flickered and she tried to stand up. "Just… tired. Sorry, I'll go back to my own now…"

Rosalie took her wrist gently and her other hand touched her forehead. She wasn't warm but Rosalie was still concerned. "Maybe you should just lie down."

"No I have to go back to my tent…"

"You don't look well Margo."

Margo frowned. "I'm fine."

"Hey –you aren't immortal. You can get sick."

"That's what mortals say to make them feel better."

But despite her words Margo willingly lay down again and closed her eyes. Rosalie turned around and saw Shannon peering in through the ten's opening.

"Can you get Jack?"

--

Brian saw that the raft was burning. The flames licked the water and spreading over it even though water wasn't supposed to be on fire. He walked through it on a pathway glittering like diamonds from the light of the inferno.

He stepped up on the burning raft but none of the flames hurt him. As much as it burned the raft didn't break or became ash. It just laid there in the water, burning but not burning up.

"Please."

The voice was like a whisper and Brian turned around. There was no one there. The voice felt familiar, but different as its owner twisted in on purpose.

"Please."

He swung around again and standing so close to him he could feel her heart beat he saw Flor. Her grey eyes reflected the flames but just like him she was untouched.

"Please." A tear escaped her eye and he saw how the skin around it became blue like a bruise. "Please help me."

He wanted to touch her but as he reached out a hand she took a step back. She looked into his eyes and she was now sobbing. "Sorry," she said and took another step back. The flames set her body ablaze and Brian screamed, screamed and screamed.

He woke up to the roof over his head, the shelter he had built. He was sweating and he still had the dream of Flor burnt inside his mind. He sat up and blinked several times. He hated that dream. It was almost always the same, the raft, Flor, only that she said different things each time. Sometimes she didn't say 'please' at all, sometimes she didn't ask for help and sometimes she just was there. But it always ended with her burning up in front of his eyes.

He opened his backpack and took out the journal as he always did when he was restless. He flipped through the pages of Latin writings and it made no more sense after a bad dream than it did at day.

"Hey."

Brian quickly closed the book and saw Claire standing outside his place. She looked tired, weak but she also looked happy like only a mother could after getting a child. In her right hand she held a bottle of water.

"Hi."

"Can I come in?"

Brian chuckled. "Sure."

She sat down on the passenger's seat he'd dragged there and bit her lip like she always did when she was nervous or thinking. "I think I remember something."

"Remember what?"

Claire looked at him and her eyes were full of worry. "From the time I was kidnapped." She opened the bottle and took a sip from it. "I… I remember something about Owen."

Brian met her gaze. "Yes Owen was there with you –"

"No… not like that. I know Owen was with me but… I remember her, Brian – I was drugged, all the time and everything's blurry but Owen she – she was always clear."

"You mean that you were more present when you were with her?"

"No, I mean that she wasn't as drugged as me."

It could mean anything. Brian didn't see it as an important detail but to Claire that little piece of memory seemed to be of great meaning. "Do you remember anything useful like where they are, their base or –"

"Is that my diary?"

Brian quickly looked down at his open back pack. "Uh…"

Claire snatched the diary from it and opened it. "It _is_ my diary. Did you have this on you the whole time? Did you? I asked you where it was and you lied didn't you? Have you read it?"

She talked really fast and Brian blinked confused. Wait, what was the question? He thought.

She stood up. "I can't believe you would do this to me!"

She stormed off and Brian looked after her. Motherhood had made Claire more confusing than ever.

--

"Where are you off to?"

Brian turned and saw Claret standing with her arms crossed by his side. Her dark, curly hair was pulled into pigtails and she wore strange clothes, almost like hunting attire. She looked almost excited at them. Excited?

Shannon also noticed how different Claret seemed and she smiled. "To search for Boone, let me guess – you're on your way for your date with Crocodile Dundee?"

"Very funny." Claret still smiled. "Can I come along?"

Shannon caught Brian's glance. Claret did seem better now – but … well…

"Do you want to come?" No one else seemed to like going on search-parties.

Claret nodded eagerly. "Yeah!"

They glanced at each other again. "Sure," Shannon said and sighed. "But we're leaving now and you don't seem to have packed –"

"But oh yes I have!" Claret grinned and showed her backpack.

This was going to be fun.

--

"She's not sick. She's just tired and needs to drink more water." Jack repeated to Rosalie who still had a worried frown on her face.

Rosalie finally relaxed. "She just seemed so distant yesterday."

"We've all been put through a lot. It can be exhausting and stressful. It _is_ exhausting and stressful for all of us. She just needs to relax again."

Jack wandered away again. Rosalie stood outside her tent with her thoughts, now, what had made Margo smile and be so joyful before?

"Hey, Zidler!" she shouted.

--

There were tons of concrete everywhere. But Fox and Owen had found a way to get underneath, it had taken all night but when they found a dark tunnel underneath the floor it was worth it. They crawled forward and Owen watched the weird pipes around them. She touched one of them and swore. They were hot.

"What's all this stuff?" Owen asked Fox who crawled before her.

"I thi – think there's a – a geo – geothermal generator here somewhere."

"Geothermal what?"

"Po – power that gets extracted from the earth."

"I still don't understand, and it has nothing to do with your stuttering."

"Me neither. The con - concrete poured here… it's like Cher – Chernobyl."

Owen almost hit her head on one of the pipes. "Fox, is that the alarm?"

"We should get back."

--

Claret was brilliant.

She could track through the jungle better than them, Brian had never thought she was that kind of type who liked to go on treks but she was good at it. She had at least saved Shannon from falling off a cliff three or four times already, and none of those times were Brian's fault, no matter what Shannon said about killing conspiracies.

When the sun was set at the top of the sky they decided to take a break. Brian took out the water bottles he'd packed and handed them out.

"Thanks," Claret said and beamed at him. Shannon had a frown on her face and looked around at the jungle. She opened up her own bag and started to pack out her things.

Claret looked confused. "Uh… Shannon?"

"Yeah?"

"Why did you bring nail polish?"

"To paint my nails."

Claret and Brian avoided each other's gaze carefully and tried to hold down their shock and laughter.

"Well," Brian said and tried to keep his voice steady, "maybe it will become useful. I know that boars always hesitate to hurt people with well manicured hands."

Shannon glared at him and turned to Claret for support. Who were currently almost eating her hand not to burst of laughter.

"You'll just wait –"

A load growl shut Shannon up and Claret jumped up on her feet only to slip and fall again. Brian was smoother and quickly took out one of the knives they brought and turned around.

"Was that a boar?" Claret sounded panicked and moved closer to Brian. "They only attack if they're being agitated right? Right?"

"Claret."

"Yes?"

"Will you kindly shut up?"

It began to rain. Brilliant, Brian thought, another detail to the frightening growls that became louder and louder. Shannon let out a yelp and took up the nail polish in her hand as if to protect it from the raindrops. The sudden rain still surprised them after all this time on the Island.

Suddenly they saw the boar. It wasn't that big but Brian found himself taking a step back. The animal scared him. It simply watched them and Brian heard Claret's breaths become more rapid.

It suddenly charged at them. Brian swung clumsily with the knife but the board lashed up with its tusks. Claret screamed and jumped to the side and Brian was pushed down to the ground. The boar charged again and Shannon let out a battle cry and the bottle of nail polish right in the boar's eye.

Brian saw how Shannon took the knife and threw it at the boar, it missed but the boar didn't seem to know where it was going and fled before Shannon managed to throw the knife again.

"You're bleeding!"

Brian looked down at his stomach and realized that the boar's tusks had ripped off his shirt and he had long bleeding marks over his bare stomach. He almost fainted at the sight of it. As Claret cleaned up the blood they realized that the wounds weren't that deep and Shannon sacrificed one of her vests as bandage. It was quite nice to have two pretty women fret and nurse over him for a while. Only if could stop raining.

"Are you feeling okay?"

Actually, Brian didn't feel that horrible as one would expect. Once again he thought of the fact that he had miraculously healed from fatal injuries before. "I feel a bit lightheaded. It might have something to do with the fact that I'm laying on mud, which I don't think is very sterile and good for injuries."

The pain he felt as he moved was made up by the fact that Shannon looked at him like he was some kind of hero, when it was she who actually saved them. Well, he wasn't going to argue about that he thought as she gave him an admiring glance and put an arm around him.

They found a place where the branches and leaves gave them some protection against the falling rain. Claret was sulking; she blamed the whole boar attack on herself, saying that she should have seen the tracks or something.

Shannon on the other hand had started to realize that nail polish actually had gotten handy in the boar attack and went from cooing over Brian to pure glee.

"I am deadly hurt!" Brian said loudly, offended that Shannon's admiration hadn't lasted long.

"You are not deadly hurt. But you would've been if it weren't for me!"

"Can you two lower your voices?" Claret begged and looked out into the jungle. The sun that before had been so blazing was gone and the jungle was in an eerily blue color from the rain. "I would prefer if the boar didn't attack us again."

"It won't." Shannon looked proud of herself. "The nail polish made sure of that."

"Shush," Claret whispered and Shannon went silent. Brian felt like he suddenly got cold, it must be the blood loss.

Brian wanted to ask why she had silenced them, when he saw something – like a shadow emerging and disappearing, flickering like a bad light bulb. Shannon grabbed his hand.

"Walt," Shannon whispered.

The boy stood before them between the green plants. He was dressed in different clothes than those he had when he left on the raft. His eyes were closed and he was soaking wet from the rain. He mumbled incoherent words and Brian could see his eyes moving inside the closed eyelids.

Whispered words filled his ears, but they weren't Walt's. He gripped Shannon's hand tighter but she freed herself and darted forward.

"WALT!" she yelled and Brian tried to stand up, stop her, he didn't know why but he had to. Walt disappeared.

A shot rang out.

Shannon stumbled on her feet and turned around. Her purple blouse became blood red. She stared at Brian. Her eyes screaming but nothing came from her lips.

He didn't know he had run towards her, not before she fell in his arms and he heard her last, dying breath before she went completely silent.

Over her shoulder he saw a gun raised in the air.

He attacked.

--

**Author's Notes: **Thank you all so much, gosh, you have no idea how much every single review means to me. Thank you!

Brian's ripped of shirt is a dedication to hjr's incredibly funny story Lost Messed Up. Go and read it my minions, err, fellow readers.

I finished NaNoWriMo. I won. I can't believe I did it. I finished this chapter and my novel today. So any mistakes blame NaNoWriMo on it and my poor hands!

Thank you all again for your reviews, they mean so much!


	19. Eternal Streams

_A voice from out the Future cries,  
"On! on!"- but o'er the Past  
(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies  
Mute, motionless, aghast!_

_For, alas! alas! me  
The light of Life is o'er!  
"No more- no more- no more-"  
(Such language holds the solemn sea  
To the sands upon the shore)  
Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree  
Or the stricken eagle soar!_

And all my days are trances,  
And all my nightly dreams  
Are where thy grey eye glances,  
And where thy footstep gleams-  
In what ethereal dances,  
By what eternal streams.

- To One in Paradise by Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 17, Eternal Streams**

--

Lalita glanced at her wife sleeping in the seat closest to the window. She smiled. Rosalie always looked so peaceful when she was asleep. Lalita herself could never sleep when they were in the air. She hadn't told them but she was afraid of airplanes. She felt like she was defying the laws of physics somehow.

"Mama Bear."

Lalita looked at the teenager sitting at her other side. "Yes Eva?"

"I want to go to the bathroom."

Lalita turned a page in the book she was reading. "Then go pumpkin."

"Not _alone_," Eva said like it was the most horrifying suggestion in the world. Lalita sighed, closed the book and they pushed their way through the narrow places between the seats. Lalita mumbled excuses to everyone.

Suddenly the plane lurched and Eva shrieked, earning a laugh from some of the sitting passengers on the plane.

"It's just turbulence," Lalita said more assuring to herself than to her daughter.

Eva looked a bit sick. "I know."

"_Ladies and gentlemen, the pilot has switched on the "fasten seatbelt" sign. Please return to your seats and fasten your seatbelts."_

A stewardess walked past them and repeated the line before she rushed away down the plane.

Lalita took Eva's hand. "Let's go back to our seats –"

The plane lurched again. Lalita cried and was thrown against the wall. Eva was thankfully saved by a man who took her arm before she fell over too.

She tried to stand up but the plane lurched again. She was slammed against the floor. Lalita touched her head and felt blood. Eva screamed again and Lalita tried to reach her. She saw from the ground how the man pulled an oxygen mask on her daughter. She blinked and then the world blackened before her eyes.

--

"Emma! Emma!"

"HELP! HEEEELP!"

"My daughter! Have you seen my daughter?"

Andrea gasped and fought for oxygen as she reached the surface. Her ears rang and screams filled the air around her. She kicked with her tired legs to stay above the water. She coughed and blinked. Her vision blurred. The screams were misplaced. So strange.

"EMMA!"

She tried to swim her way forward. Her mind stopped to function as all she could think about was to make it to the shore. Debris sank and floated around her. Blood surrounding a body.

She spit out the water and rested her head against the sticky sand and finally saw clear. Her head hurt like hell and her ear pounded like crazy. She turned her head to the side.

"C'mon! C'mon!"

A dark-haired woman was performing CPR on a little girl on the beach. The little girl had wet blonde hair and couldn't be more than four. Andrea continued to cough and watched the scene in front of her.

"C'mon!"

The plane – it had been shaking. She remembered putting on her seatbelt and the panic that had started to rise…

"Please… c'mon!"

She'd… she'd told the person on her side to also put on the seatbelt and then…

"C'MON!"

The girl coughed and threw up water, crying and falling into the woman's arms.

The plane crashed.

"You okay?"

Andrea blinked and looked up at the man standing before the sun. His skin was dark and wore a black suit. He was talking but she couldn't hear. She turned her right ear towards him and shook her head.

The man ran away and she pulled herself up on her elbows. She stared out at the crash site before her eyes. The plane had crashed into the water and she saw bodies float around in the waves. Some people were pulling them out of the water and others were helping the people on the beach.

_This can't be happening._

"HELP! Help! There's someone in the jungle!"

Someone grabbed her arm and she whirled around, immediately feeling dizzy. A girl had rushed out from the trees. She had long black hair and Andrea thought she looked Chinese.

"Help, you have to help me there's someone… I heard the screams."

"Yeah, yeah of course!" Her head was spinning wildly but she tried to regain sense and followed the girl into the jungle. The heat was unbelievable and even the air felt hot as she breathed. She touched her left ear and felt blood. As they ran she snapped her fingers by it but she couldn't hear anything.

"Oh no...."

Andrea stared up at the tree. It was huge from growing freely in the wild and in it there were a passenger's seat stuck. An old man and a girl by his side clung onto the seats for their life. The girl whimpered and closed her eyes.

"He – help…" the man said and looked like he was about to die of fear.

"All right." Andrea tried to stay calm, but inside her mind she was screaming. She couldn't do this. It looked like the seats were about to fall off. She couldn't help them. She couldn't even hear from her left ear anymore.

"Ma – mama?"

The Asian girl by her side looked scared, but determined. "We're going to get you out of there!"

Andrea stared at the girl like she was crazy.

"Now please?" the girl in the tree whined.

Andrea swallowed. "Okay, um… try to reach the tree branch by your side…"

"Are you serious?" the man shouted. Andrea clenched her teeth together. The pain in her head was unbelievable.

"Just try it!"

"Okay…" the man reached to his side and took a hard grip around the branch. The girl at his side though didn't have a chance to reach it.

"What's your name?"

"Eva," the girl answered.

"Eva, try to unbuckle your seatbelt and you –"

"Bernard."

"You Bernard take one of her hands."

"How can I do that when I'm holding the tree branch?"

Eva carefully unbuckled her seatbelt. The seat gave a worriedly creaking sound. Andrea suddenly saw in her mind how it would go. The man Bernard would hold onto the branch for his life while the girl would crash to her death.

She turned to the other girl at her side. "You –"

"Kimika."

"Okay Kim, go to the beach and try to find more people who can help okay?"

Kim nodded and darted away in the jungle. Andrea took a deep breath and another screeching sound was heard. Her left ear throbbed painfully.

"EVA!"

Andrea swung around and saw a woman run towards the tree and in one fast motion start to climb up on it. Dragging herself up by the branches in what must be an adrenaline rush. Andrea stared in awe as the woman managed to help Bernard get to another branch beneath and take Eva's hand just as the seats fell to the ground with a loud crash.

Andrea helped them down and Bernard could barely stand on his legs but he continued to shake Andrea's hand and thank her even though she had barely done a thing. Andrea looked at the woman who held Eva in her arms. She could see the love and happiness of them finding each other.

"You are like Supergirl." Andrea blushed immediately at her words.

The woman laughed. "I'm just a mother."

--

"The pilot said we'd lost communication. We're two hours off course. They don't know where to look."

Andrea looked down at the little girl sleeping in her lap. Her name was Ellie Harwood. Her father wasn't there. She stroked back the girl's blonde locks and felt herself get tears in her eyes. Cindy had just told them that they needed to build signal fires, not that they wouldn't build them otherwise. But that it really, really was necessary.

"Is she okay?"

Andrea looked up and Kim sat down beside her. Andrea nodded. "She's shaken up. Scared. But she got hope. She'll… be fine I think."

"She was yelling after her father?"

Andrea nodded solemnly and whispered: "He isn't here. He's not one of the bodies either. He must have gone down with the plane."

They both looked to the side. The man, Eko had dragged the bodies out of the water. Andrea didn't have any loved ones on the flight, neither had Kim but they saw Lalita stalk towards him. Andrea didn't know much. But the girl Eva had shouted after another mother. As Eko shook his head they saw Lalita drop on her knees, fighting back the tears. She and Eko talked in low voices before she stood up again.

Andrea's gaze followed Lalita as she walked down the beach to one of the places where they were trying to get a fire. Eva stood up and Lalita hugged her. Andrea couldn't imagine how hard it was for them.

"Water?" A man walked over to them.

"Thank you… I'm sorry I didn't catch you name –"

"Goodwin." The man smiled and nodded to them before he walked down the beach to help others. Andrea took a sip out of the bottle and handed it to Kim.

"Cool that he managed to find water so fast." Kim looked impressed.

"Yeah."

They still hadn't gotten a fire as the night closed in. Andrea found an almost dry blanket which she pulled over Ellie's sleeping form. She lay down so her right ear was up beside the girl. There were lots of noises and she could get silence from lying on the other side with the ear she couldn't hear with up – but she didn't feel safe enough.

She heard Ana-Lucia and Libby whisper to each to each other for a while before the whole camp went silent, except for the quite sobs.

Andrea had just started to get used to the sand in her back and started to drift off when she heard a strange noise.

Kim sat up. "What was that?"

Andrea stood up quickly. "Watch Ellie."

She heard a cry and soon the whole camp was awake.

"Over here!" Goodwin shouted and she followed the direction of his voice. It wasn't easy. She couldn't really decide where the sounds came from because of her ear. Soon she started to see shapes in the dark.

"What happened?" she yelled.

In front of her by the edge of the forest she saw Eko slowly stand up. On the ground before him two bodies lay and in his hand he gripped a rock. Blood on his hands.

Andrea stared and was afraid she would throw up. "What kind of priest are you?"

--

"Three are missing." Libby looked worriedly around. "Zack, Emma. And the German we helped with his leg."

Ana-Lucia stood up. "They have nothing on them," she said and looked down at the bodies of the woman and the man. "No wallets, no identification of any sort, and they're barefoot."

Andrea chewed on her lip. She wasn't sure she'd heard right. Her left ear was still almost mute. But her right one seemed stronger than ever. "Why… who are they?"

"I think they were here before us."

Andrea looked confused. "Like some sort of kidnapping natives?"

"Cannibals." Kim's eyes were wide in shock. "They're cannibals. They're going to eat us all."

"Don't be stupid," Andrea said but she shivered. "Is it safe for us at the beach then? Shouldn't we move?"

"We can't move!" Kim suddenly said, and it was strange how her tone changed from terrified to brave all the sudden. "We got children and injured. We need to be here so they can see the fires."

The others agreed and scattered. Ana-Lucia stayed on the spot, frowning, looking after Kim who went into the jungle. By the water, Eko took on a vow of silence.

--

"Kim is amazing!"

Andrea looked up from the fish she was preparing and saw Kim, Eva, Libby and Goodwin return from the jungle.

Eva beamed. "Kim found the perfect trees for fruit and an even better water source!"

"Born to be in the wild huh?" Andrea smiled and accepted the coconut Kim gave her.

"How do you know so much about surviving Kimika?" Ana-Lucia seemed angry for some reason.

Kim shrugged but looked happy at her success. "I've traveled a lot."

"That doesn't really answer anything," Ana-Lucia muttered, but it was only Andrea who heard her.

--

"And when I see Mama Rose again, I can tell her so many things! Like how I've learned to climb, and catch fish and…"

The girl continued to chat away happily. Andrea didn't know what to do when she was near Eva. She was so sure that her mother was fine somewhere. Lalita also seemed to believe that her wife was alive and well.

Andrea was sure they were alone, but she sure hoped she was wrong.

"You've been gone for two hours."

"I have?"

Andrea looked up and saw Ana-Lucia glare at Kim who seemed to just have returned from the jungle.

"Why?"

"I was at the – um, bathroom."

"We have a system for that. We go in pairs."

"Sorry."

Ana-Lucia stomped away from the girl who stood a bit confused by the trees. Andrea stood up and ran over to Ana, a slight frown on her face.

"What was that about?"

Ana halted. "What?"

"You got to lay off her a little - I don't understand why you're so angry at Kim all the time."

Ana glared. "Why don't you just take care of your own business kid?"

--

Andrea watched the fire roar its flames up in the air. Once they got a fire burning, it really burned. She remembered that she had just waited and waited for rescue at first, but now… it had gone several days. They had set up a pretty good camp and the last night she fell asleep quickly.

She'd gotten used to the Island. It was bad.

"Drop, drop, drop."

Andrea let the little girl sit in her lap and she put the blanket around them. "Drop, drop what?"

Ellie smiled and said cheerfully: "It's a song."

"A song huh?" Andrea watched the fire and Ellie nodded.

Ellie took a deep breath and sang: "Drop, drop, drop. The rain falls again. Drop, drop, drop. You will never see me again. Drop, drop, drop. Until the rain falls again. Drop, drop, drop…"

PANG!

Ellie screamed in Andrea's ear and Andrea was thankful she couldn't hear with it. They looked around and she saw the survivors running. She quickly took Ellie up in her arms and ran towards Libby.

"Take her!" she yelled and rushed after the attackers.

She whirled around and saw them drag the girl – Eva and she lashed out blindly. Not even giving a thought that she had no weapons. No skills in fighting at all. She just went for the woman's eyes and blindly scratched and kicked. The woman's fist connected with her head and she fell backwards, stumbled but managed to stay on her feet. She grabbed a stone and smashed it over the woman's head. She went still.

From the ground Eva screamed.

--

"Andrea… Andrea what are you doing? Andy… Andy STOP!"

Lalita grabbed her wrist and Andrea tried to get out of her grip. Angry tears fell from her face and in the end she bit the woman's hand.

"OUCH! Andrea –"

Andrea went back to furiously rub her hands with sand and wash them in the sea. The sharp sand irritated her skin and her hands were red with prickles of blood.

"Andrea what are you doing?"

"The… blood… won't… come OFF!"

Andrea clenched her fist and hit her other hand with it. "It won't come off!"

"ANDREA!"

Lalita grabbed both of her hands and made so that Andrea's was facing her. "Sweetie, calm down. Calm down." They were all stressed. Almost everyone had been taken.

"The blood." Andrea's voice was choked up and hoarse. "The blood will never come off. I am a murderer."

Lalita slowly released her grip of the girl's hands and pulled her into a hug. She didn't care that they were in the middle of the water. That the girl was spilling blood, sweat and tears on her clothes.

"You are not a murderer. You are a heroine. You saved my daughter. You didn't kill. You saved. You saved…"

--

Next time, Andrea promised herself as they walked through the jungle on a search after a safer place. Next time she wouldn't be foolish and kill them at first sight. Next time she would manage to kidnap one of them instead.

They put out the fire at their old camp. Said goodbye to the graves. There was nothing at the beach left for them anymore.

Andrea had grown cold since the last abduction and Ellie had found her protector in Ana-Lucia. Andrea didn't like the woman very much, but she was different with the child. Caring. And Andrea knew Ana would protect Ellie with her life.

"Can't we stay here?"

Andrea bit her lip. The question wasn't directed to her. Ana-Lucia looked around suspiciously.

"No –"

Andrea knew it was childish, but she stomped her foot. "Oh, please! We can't just keep walking and walking, have you forgotten about living? It's nice here. There's water and trees as protection…"

Libby nodded. "I think we should stay."

Eva sat down by the river and took off her shoes and dipped her feet into the water. Ellie joined her and Goodwin laughed at the two children playing and splashing. Kim laughed and even Eko managed a smile but still he didn't say anything.

"Fine," Ana growled.

--

Lalita left the group by the water and stepped through the jungle. She was surprised how easily she avoided falling over stones and ducking underneath branches and vines, how she had gotten used to the sounds, the heat and the smell. It was almost too easy. She wasn't supposed to feel like she belonged in this land was she?

"Ana?"

Lalita saw Ana-Lucia furiously digging in the earth. The sun was high and it must be unbearable for her.

"Ana!"

Ana stopped and turned around. "What?"

"I'm here to give you more water."

"Thanks." Ana accepted the bottle and drank greedily from it.

"And to ask you what you're doing."

Ana looked down at the pit she was digging. She inhaled deeply and started to dig again. "I'm digging."

"I can see that. The reason why is more unclear."

"You'll see."

--

For once, Andrea and Ana-Lucia helped each other. Andrea was restless but still tired of being afraid all the time and digging that pit was a way to keep her thoughts away from home and the real world.

Because the island didn't feel like the real world. It was surreal. The jungle and the people taking them for no reason, the constant fear and the struggle for survival – who knew that this was going to happen to them?

When they were finished Ana started to work on a cover.

"Is it like a trap for animals?" Andrea knew that wasn't the answer, but she liked to pretend it was.

Ana shook her head.

--

"You can't throw Kim down there!" Bernard yelled. The man didn't often get angry, not even now; he mostly looked desperate and concerned.

Ana-Lucia couldn't help but smirk. "Just did that didn't I?"

"You can't be serious," Lalita spat. "Kim is not one of them!"

Eko didn't say anything but his face was grim in disagreement. Ellie held Eva's hand hard and looked worried at the adults arguing.

"She disappears for hours at a time. She knows the island mysteriously well – at the crash site she wasn't wet at all even though we all were in the water!"

"Andy," Goodwin said," what do you think?"

Andrea thought back at when she had first seen Kim. Had she been wet from the sea? She couldn't remember. But Bernard and Eva had landed in a tree, maybe Kim did something similar. "I think we must be certain. Did anyone of you see her on the plane?"

"I did!" Ellie chirped. But none of them paid attention to her.

"I'm good with faces." Cindy looked at Ana. "I didn't see her around."

Lalita crossed her arms. "Well – what if she is one of them? What will we do?"

None of them came up with an answer. Ana-Lucia left through the trees to question Kim, Andrea followed her.

--

"What's your name?"

Kim looked confused. "You know my name. It's Kimika, Kimika Yamazaki."

She stood at the bottom of the pit. She looked so scared and small and Andrea felt guilty as she watched the girl. She looked innocent. But maybe that was why she was sent to infiltrate them.

"Where are you from?" Ana-Lucia asked in the same insensitive tone.

"I – I'm from Tokyo, Japan. Why are you doing this? You can't just… just…" She tried to find the right word. "Imprison me!"

"Yes we can."

Kim's lips shivered. "I haven't done anything."

"Why were you on the plane?" Andrea asked in a much gentler voice than Ana-Lucia. Ana gave her a look that said 'good'. Andrea frowned. Oh, so now she was the good cop?

"I was going to be a… a maid of honor. My friend, Angela was getting married."

"If you are from Japan why were you in Australia?"

"I was travelling around the world. You… you can't do this to me. Please… just because you didn't see me on the plane – I didn't see you on the plane either!"

Ana smiled cruelly. "That's because you weren't on it."

--

"Do you think what we're doing to Kim is the right thing?" Andrea looked curiously at Goodwin.

Goodwin seemed to drift off in thought. "I don't know."

Andrea was silent for a while. "Do you think we're becoming like them?"

"What do you mean?" he asked quickly.

"Well…" Andrea didn't really know how to explain it, "we take a girl against her will and lock her up - isn't that what _they_ are doing?"

"Maybe they are doing something entirely different."

--

"Where are the kids Kim? Where are the kids?"

"I don't know!"

Kim had been down there for days. Each day her face became dirtier. It had rained and she was smudged with mud all over her skin. Her eyes were hungry.

Ana-Lucia sighed and then she saw something in the corner. "What's that – is that a banana?"

"I… I…"

"Who gave it to you?"

Kim looked fallen and Ana heard steps behind her, she swung around and saw the whole group stand there.

"Ellie did."

Ana-Lucia threw one last look at Kim before she stood up and faced them. "Why would you do that Ellie?"

Ellie didn't answer and held Eva's hand harder.

"You can't keep her down there anymore Ana," Libby said and took a step forward. "She's not one of them. We're not savages – we have to let her up."

"She _is_ one of them."

"No, Ana she's not." It was Andrea who spoke and she also took a step forward. "It's time for you to stand back."

--

"I'm sorry."

"You don't have to say that all the time Lita."

Lalita smiled tearfully. "Yes I know. But – I'm still sorry. We shouldn't have thrown you down there."

Kim glanced up the river. Ana-Lucia was talking and laughing with Goodwin.

"What's done is done." She smiled sadly.

--

Bernard was setting a trap for rabbits. Ellie and Eva both looked traumatized as he showed them exactly how the poor little animal would get killed.

"And then," he said, completely unaware of their horror, "we'll take their skin and –"

"Hey!" Andrea interrupted. "Eva, Ellie why don't you go back to the river? I think Libby needs help with something – like, shrink, psychiatrist stuff."

They both ran away quickly, relieved.

"Do you want to know how it works?"

"Already do," Andrea smiled at the old man.

"How's Kim doing?" he asked. "I feel so much guilt for what happened to her."

"Yeah me too. She'll be fine I hope. But she doesn't trust us anymore."

"That's understandable."

Andrea nodded and sat down on the ground.

A scream interrupted their silence. Andrea was quickly on her feet again. "What was that?"

"The river – the camp."

Andrea didn't bother to wait for him. She darted through the trees and she heard Bernard pant behind her. Thousands of worst case scenarios went through her head.

The camp was at chaos. It was the middle of the day. It wasn't supposed to happen then.

Lalita's head was down in the river and to her horror Andrea saw the water become red. She jumped on the wet rocks and stumbled to the woman's side and pulled her face out of the water. Libby was kneeling on the ground a hand on her stomach while she panted:

"They – they took the kids… Ana, Cindy and – and Goodwin followed them… Is, is she dead?"

"C'mon," Andrea whispered but Lalita didn't breathe. The wound on her head continued to bleed. But it wasn't that deep and she was more worried about the water that must be in her lungs. Bernard rushed to Libby's side.

"C'mon!"

"Can – can I help?"

"Get the kids!"

Bernard ran away but Libby stayed at her side. Still holding her stomach and watching her try to get the mother back to her life. Andrea closed the woman's nose and breathed into her mouth.

"C'mon!"

Lalita coughed and coughed. She was breathing again and Andrea laughed with relief despite the situation.

"Eva!" Lalita coughed and she threw up her arms in the air like she saw her daughter in front of her. "Eva!"

Andrea knew what she had to do. She turned to Libby. "Will you take care of her?"

Libby nodded weakly.

They had taken their best constructed weapons but she saw one of the smaller knives left. She grabbed the US army knife and Libby pointed in a direction and she set off.

Blind rage. She didn't think of anything else than the blood pumping in her body and kill. Kill those bastards who thought they could just take human lives, children, daughters. Her mind flashed to the image of Lalita by the water. Did Eva think her mother was dead?

"EVA!" she screamed. "ELLIE! EKO! CINDY?"

"Andrea!"

Andrea whirled on the spot. Goodwin came out from a couple of green bushes and hinted to her to come close. Something told her not to. It was the way he looked, never ever stressed, was that blood on his shirt?

"Where are the kids? Ana?" she asked desperately.

"Come," he hissed. "_They_ are close."

Andrea looked around at the long vines and the heavy stones. She didn't see anyone. But she quickly went to his side and he pulled her in behind the bushes. The force made her stumble and she fell to the ground behind them. She had fallen over something. She saw Goodwin's smirk above her and she turned her head to the side.

Cindy laid there. Her neck snapped. Blood ran down her mouth.

Andrea screamed and lashed out with the knife. It distracted Goodwin for one second and she rolled to the side and his knife missed her. It hit the ground instead. She kicked with her legs and she thought she hit him before she crawled up on her feet. She took one step and suddenly Goodwin pressed up against her back. His hands on either side of her head. She closed her eyes and thought of Cindy's dead body.

BANG!

Andrea felt a sharp pain in her spine and she fell down on her knees. She opened her eyes and between the tears she saw Ana-Lucia rushing towards her. Smoke rose from the gun. Andrea didn't look behind her. She knew that Goodwin was dead. She didn't need to see it.

"It wasn't Kim after all," Andrea whispered before she passed out.

--

"Drop, drop, drop. The rain falls again. Drop, drop, drop. You will never see me again. Drop, drop, drop. They'll come and take us again…"

The song flooded into her mind and slowly she heard the sound of the trees, the small humming from the insects and the low voices from afar, but one of her ears were still painfully silent. She blinked and she heard someone yell. The hand holding hers disappeared and the voices grew louder.

"What…" she mumbled and her eyes sprung open. The light blinded her and she covered her face with a weak hand.

She saw Lalita's face above hers. "Oh thank lord! You're awake!"

She tried to sit up but she heard Libby's voice. "Lay down. I'll get you some water."

"You're probably wondering what happened." It was Kim's voice.

"Ellie… Eva?"

Suddenly Lalita's face disappeared from her view and she saw Bernard sitting by her feet.

"They came to the camp. They were so quick…" Kim said in a hoarse voice. "They took Ellie and Eva before we could react. They – they pushed Lalita down in the river and they hurt us. Goodwin and Cindy managed to follow them first, and then Ana got up on her feet and did the same."

"But Ellie… she's…"

"I'm here," Ellie said a bit solemn.

"Hey, honey what do you say we go and…"

The rest of the words faded as Bernard took Ellie's hand and walked away with her.

Kim looked like she was at the edge of tears. "Ana managed to save Ellie, but Eva… she's gone. Cindy's gone too… Goodwin, he killed her. I think they just took Eva."

"He tried to kill me didn't he?" Andrea remembered the pain.

"He stuck a knife inside your back just as Ana shot him with a gun she got from one of the others she killed. She's good. She said she could've hit you."

Andrea swallowed. "How bad is it?"

"We thought you would never wake up," Kim said honestly. "But you healed very well. Libby was surprised, but all of our wounds healed pretty fast. It's not all bad."

"Kim?"

"Yeah?"

"Sorry."

She heard Kim's confusion in her voice. "For what?"

Andrea didn't answer. She didn't have the strength. She closed her eyes and let the darkness take her once again.

--

"This is our life now isn't it?"

Lalita's eyes were side and she stopped washing the clothing in the river. "We will never get out of here."

Eko looked at her but as always he didn't say anything.

"I…" Lalita wrinkled her face and a tear pressed through. "I… I can't believe this is our life now. And my daughter… she's… she's…"

She gave into the tears and hugged her legs close to herself. Without a sound Eko pulled his arms around her and she cried into his chest. The stream and the tears joined together at her loss.

--

It said 'QUARANTINE' inside of the door. But that didn't keep them away.

"Maybe it was a storage room," Kim said and her hand slid over the big logo on the wall. "The Arrow."

They found the door hidden between long vines, stuck in the hill. It was a bunker and electricity worked inside. So many crazy things had happened that none of them even tried to discuss how the station could have electricity at all.

"What's this?" Ellie skipped over to the box and before anyone stopped her she opened it. Andrea saw in the other's faces that she wasn't the only one expecting snakes to crawl out of it.

Eko walked towards the box slowly and took out something that looked like a bible. He studied it closely.

"A glass eye." Libby held it up. Ellie looked fascinated at it.

Andrea picked up a piece of paper. "It's a list of names…."

Lalita looked over her shoulder and read what it said. "Claire Littleton… Brian or Boone and a question mark… _Rosalie?_"

"Look at this!" Kim showed them the radio.

--

Kim and Andrea traveled together up on the hill. It was heavy work and they took many breaks. Ana had looked like she wanted to come along too, but as soon as Kim volunteered she shrunk back.

"Can't we try it here?" Kim whined and Andrea sighed.

"Sure." She pulled the radio out of the bag and turned it on.

"Let me." Andrea handed Kim the radio and she began to search for a signal.

All they heard was static and Kim began to look very frustrated – when a voice came through. She yelled in surprise.

"… _This is Brian, Brian Haligan a survivor from flight 815, Mayday, Mayday! We're the survivors of flight 815!"_

Andrea stared at her with wide eyes. Her mouth was open in shock. Kim pulled herself together first.

"But we are the survivors of flight 815!" Kim shouted into the radio.

"_Come again?"_

"We are the survivor's of flight-"

A loud cracking noise. Then the other line went silent.

--

"I was rich," Kim said simply.

Andrea glanced at the girl. They were by the sea, fishing. They had brought blankets and bottles and fruit to survive the night and the night after that. There was never fish enough and sometimes they would stay longer by the shore.

"The money never made me happy. It made it easier. But I was far more happy when I didn't have that much. I was poor a while too. That was horrible. I just want to be in the middle."

Andrea didn't understand the whole sharing part, but maybe saying it out loud was the only thing to make it real. That it had been real.

"I was a pediatrician," Andrea said and threw the net in the water.

"I… I didn't really have a job."

--

"You will see your daughter again."

None of them acknowledged the fact that Eko had for the first time for over forty days spoken, but after that Lalita wasn't dead with sorrow. Sometimes she would even smile.

"We can't just sit around."

It was Libby.

So they didn't. They decided to explore the island more, despite of their fear.

Eko, Bernard, Ana-Lucia and Lalita decided to stay behind as Andrea, Ellie, Kim and Libby trekked through the jungle. Maybe they went because they wanted to find someone, those who had been taken.

Ellie said she went because she was tired of being at the same place all the time, but Andrea knew it was more. She'd heard the little girl tell Ana-Lucia at night about her dreams, about her father and how she had to help him. Ana pretended to understand.

It was at night when they heard the twig break and without hesitation Kim pulled the trigger, and shot the guy in the leg.

--

He was out for a long time. The wound wasn't that bad and Andrea didn't understand why Ellie and Kim fuzzed over him so much. He was one of them.

She was just glad they would maybe get the chance to interrogate him.

When he woke up at first he wasn't that feverish, but he still rambled on and on about dynamite and someone named Claire and Jack. The infections got to him and after that he was completely delirious.

They didn't throw him in the pit. They couldn't interrogate him. Ana suggested they put him out of his misery.

Then Andrea and Ellie were alone at the bunker. His eyes fluttered and he opened them, and he really saw them.

"Where am I?"

Andrea hushed Ellie who wanted to say something.

"I… who are you?"

She understood he was actually present. "Why don't you tell me who you are?"

"I need to get Jack. He must help her… he must help…"

He was out again.

She couldn't put him out of his misery. She couldn't. She was a doctor; she was supposed to help people. Not kill them.

She told him her name. He didn't remember it.

--

"I wanted to be a teacher."

Bernard just ate his fruit and Kim looked down at the dying boy.

--

They went to the beach to catch fish, hunt for food. Ellie was tired of being locked inside the bunker all the time. So she came too.

But when they say them, those others washed up ashore it all went quick.

All they saw was red.

--

They threw them down the pit. Ana smirked and said 'I told you so' to all of them. Andrea didn't understand why.

--

"We need find out the truth."

Eko looked at her and nodded. Then he hit Andrea hard in the face.

--

"Who are you?" she asked and watched them. It was two men and one girl. One of them looked Chinese or Japanese or something, the other one was the one who had screamed after his son.

"We crashed here. We were on a plane. Sydney to Los Angeles." The girl told her. She nodded and acted surprised.

Later she took their gun from them.

--

"… And then the raft exploded. They took two of us, Flor and my son Walt. We floated in the sea until we washed up here," Michael told them.

Andrea looked at Eko and Ana.

"We have to talk."

--

They couldn't believe it. Other survivors. Hope. Because the fact that they were alive – it was hope, just hope.

But hope had been taken out of their hands before, so they kept her mood down at didn't smile and cheer like they wanted. Instead they watched with suspicious eyes Jin, Michael and Lori.

None of them dared to ask much about them and their camp. In fear of disappointment. Lalita hadn't asked about her wife and neither had Bernard. Maybe it was more tortuous that way, but they all had pain.

The guy's name was Boone. He was dying because of them. Another one to the long list of deaths and…

Andrea looked down at the list she'd carried around. What a coincidence that his name was on it.

"Don't mistake coincidence for fate," Lori quoted what Eko had said earlier. Andrea didn't know how she knew her thoughts.

Andrea didn't like Lori. She acted like she knew pain.

She hadn't gone through what they had gone through.

--

The whispers shocked them. Ellie hugged Lalita, scared. Kim froze as the rain broke down on them and looked up. Jin rambled in Korean. Bernard asked questions and watched the jungle around them. Ana-Lucia held the gun in her shivering hands. They heard a scream.

BANG!

All Andrea thought when the dead girl fell into the boy's arms was: _Not again._

--

**Author's Notes: **Introducing, **Andrea 'Andy' Elizabeth **submitted by President Laura Roslin, **Eloise 'Ellie' Harwood** submitted by kab16, **Lalita Renee' Burton** and **Eva Rosalie Mills-Burton**by DiorNicole and finally **Kimika 'Kim' Yamazaki **submitted by Elyad.

I have hinted that these characters would be in this story from the beginning, (go back and you'll see) and was glad to have introduced them all now! I was freaking out with all the ideas on how to write them and I hope this wasn't too rushed.

I am sick with some sort of flu and really angry about it, but hey – more time to write right?

You guys are the best, thank you all for your reviews! Since I'm pathetically in love with getting reviews, I decided to update early. You see the pattern here? You see what pressing that button down there and typing in words can do?

*sends telepathic messages so you'll review more*


	20. The Worst and the Best

_Lo! Death has reared himself a throne  
In a strange city lying alone  
Far down within the dim West,  
_Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best  
Have gone to their eternal rest.

- The City in the Sea by Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?**

**Chapter 21 – The Worst and the Best**

--

Kimika Yamazaiki used to be happy. Even when bad things happened, she always saw the light and positive sides of things. It didn't matter if she spilled hot tea on herself or stumbled across the street with no memory how she got there – she would always think that it was better she spilled hot tea over herself than over someone else, that it was good thing she at least was stumbling than crawling.

But she couldn't think of what was the good side of her holding a gun, Of course guns gave protection she guessed, shoot first ask questions later. But she was always on the top of her toes and her finger shivering above the trigger and she couldn't concentrate on anything else than the _freaking gun in her hand_.

No wonder she had shot the first thing – well, person that made a noise. She wasn't used to hold a gun.

She wasn't used to walk in a hot, raining jungle. Her clothes plastered to her body of sweat, the stars that were so big and bright it almost looked like she could reach out and touch them in the night. Perhaps it would've been beautiful, if she had been in a cold hotel room with air conditioner and an actual cold drink.

She wasn't used to it, never been, but she was forced to.

No matter how much she prayed, cried and screamed she could get out – it wasn't a dream, she could never wake up. The island was the reality now, she had to get used to the island.

But she would never, ever, get used to see someone die.

"No…" Ana-Lucia said in barely a whisper. For one moment she looked shocked, the gun at the edge of her fingers and she was unguarded. Stunned by the life she had taken.

Kim saw how the man let go of the woman's body. How he for one moment slowly rose up on his feet and then suddenly charged at them. The body slipped down to the ground with a thud.

Ana grabbed the gun with both of her hands, but she was too shocked to react. There was another woman rushing towards them too, but she was too far away.

Eko ran forward and tried to stop him. But the man was furious and madly kicked and punched around him. They fell down on the mud and all Kim did was to watch in horror as they fought each other. The woman with the dark curly hair screamed.

BANG!

Ana-Lucia fired her gun in the air. The man was distracted and Eko clocked him over the head with a stone. He went awfully still.

"NOBODY MOVES!"

Ellie quietly peered out from the protection from Lalita's arms and saw the dead girl, Ana with the gun and the boy passed out on the ground. She cried softly.

--

It all began when Zidler noticed that Margo, despite all logical knowledge, was in fact a woman.

And then it went downhill from there.

It would all have been sorted out if she had been a man, life would have been much simpler. Instead of thinking her wittiness was cute; he would have thought it was nerdy or something manly.

He would never have offered her to hide from the rain that day of the crash if she had been, a man. Or maybe he would have and started to get attracted to males and fallen for her – him anyway.

Zidler should not be allowed to think. It was too weird.

Usually when Kim and Dom went walking down the beach, flirting, talking and being completely obvious of the fact that they both liked each other – Margo would send glares their way while almost chopping off her fingers if she was holding a knife.

Today, Margo was too busy eating up their entire food stash.

Swallowing all his pride, he went over to her by the 'kitchen' and cleared his throat.

Margo ignored him and continued to stuff her face full with _fish _of all things.

Still, Zidler couldn't walk away and pretend that they just had a lovely conversation. He had to talk to her. (Rosalie had been really scary when she, while looking motherly and stuff had threatened to take out his intestines through his nose if he didn't talk to Margo soon), so really it wasn't by his own choice.

"Hey!" he said and waved his hands in front of her face to get her attention."Margo? Hello?"

Margo gave him a look that clearly said _'leave me alone I'm eating'_.

"I'm not going to leave." He pouted. "Someone has to make sure you don't eat up the whole camp before Locke returns with the boar."

"There's boar?" she said and looked wildly around.

"Um, is there a reason why you suddenly decided to eat everything in sight?"

"I haven't eaten you yet have I?" There was none of that usual cheeriness in her voice, and she just looked tired like she was tired with _him_. Or maybe she just was tired. He hoped so.

"Not yet," he mumbled.

He glanced to the side, by her tent Rosalie gave him two thumbs up. He took it as a sign.

"So I got to go and talk to Rosalie. So you can just… continue… eating."

Margo had just finished off the fish and was working her way towards cannibalism.

"How'd it go?" Rosalie asked with a smile.

Zidler still remembered the intestines part. "Good. We talked about food."

Rosalie frowned in confusion. "Food?"

He nodded and didn't understand why she looked so mad all the sudden.

"You didn't talk about your feelings?"

Zidler snorted. "I'm not a girl Rosalie!"

"Could've fooled me," Charlie said as he walked by.

"So you didn't talk about anything else?" Rosalie said in a whisper as Charlie left. "Nothing else? Oh Lord Zidler, you are so clueless. This thing needs a professional."

She stood up and brushed the sand off her clothes, sent him one last disbelieving shook of her head before she stalked into the jungle.

----

"Is this your card?"

"Yes!" His younger sister Elsie squealed with delight and capped her hands together. "Yes it is!"

Zidler grinned and gave his sister back the card set and she shuffled it through with wide eyes. While most of his family was since long ago tired with his tricks, Elsie was still fascinated by everything he did. She would never get tired of having coins found behind her ear at family dinners, like now.

"You found another coin!" she yelled again.

Hazel, his other sister who thought she was all adult and mature because she'd gotten her own flat rolled her eyes.

"Could you pass the salt Montgomery, please?"

Since his mother found out she had long lost English relatives she had begun to drink tea every second hour, use please and darling in every sentence and started to speak with a ridiculous fake English accent, but it didn't matter that much to him, to Hazel though who pretended she now was an adult it was very annoying and she rolled her eyes again. Zidler hoped they would one day get stuck that way. That would be funny.

Zidler reached for the salt – and the sleeve of his shirt got caught in the candle.

After Zidler had screamed, pulled his arm away and fallen backwards on his chair his family decided that he was banned from everything close to fire, (he spilled the salt too).

"Seriously Zidler," Hazel sighed, "I don't understand how you seriously can be one of the not _awful _magicians in Vegas with the coordination you have."

'Not awful' was quite a compliment coming from his sister, but well, he had almost burned up.

"Thank you," he groaned from his bed. His head rested on several pillows and he insisted his arm was in an awful lot of pain, (it didn't even stung – but his mother fretted over him and gave him all sort of delicious cookies if he said that). That Hazel knew, and she rolled her eyes again.

"Really," he heard his mother say from the hallway, talking into the phone, "oh, darling that's just awful."

"What's going on?" Zidler asked his sister.

"Maybe she got confirmation that she doesn't have English roots, no seriously it was just Aunt Joyce calling or something." She liked to use the word 'seriously'.

"Zidler," his mother stood in the doorway and Zidler frowned, the fake English accent was gone, "Charlotte's…"

Zidler's eyes widened when she mentioned his cousin. "What?"

"Charlotte's dead."

----

"So who gets the shampoo?" Fox heard Wendy ask Hurley in the storage room. He peered in and saw them sitting cross-legged across each other, sorting through all the food.

"I still don't like this," Hurley admitted, "this food and all the stuff, dude, this will be the root of the _war_." He turned around and saw Fox.

"Hi – hi," Fox said awkwardly. He went there to get some chocolate but it seemed as if Hurley wasn't happy about letting everyone just take things as they pleased. "Just want – wanted to see ho – how you're doing."

"Oh, we're doing fine." Wendy grinned but Hurley looked sad. Fox nodded and left them in the storage and went to see what Owen was up to. Maybe she had gotten some chocolate before Hurley and Wendy were appointed the jobs as food supervisors.

Owen was slouched in the couch. Her feet were up on the table and she had a stack of records by her side. There was a song playing, Fox didn't know what it was and he was sure Owen would skin him alive if he admitted that.

"Hey Foxy," she greeted him. "These are awesome. There's even a Geronimo Jackson one!"

"That's great." Was there a sign of chocolate? Owen would probably keep it to herself even if she had some. The music continued to try to shatter his ears. With a sigh he went into the computer room. There were still several minutes left on the timer.

He sat down on the chair and looked at the crossword Locke had left there. But somehow he couldn't make the letters form words. His mind wandered off and he found himself daydreaming about his time back with his people.

It scared him, this, letting him stay when Ethan had been so sure they would punish him. Fox had been sure Ben would do something. But no one had fired a bullet to his head yet or even told the survivors about him.

Which meant Ben still had plans for him.

_Ding_.

Fox looked around for the source of the sounds. The music from the player was loud but he was sure it didn't come from the song. His gaze flickered to the computer screen.

_Hello?_

He blinked. The word didn't disappear. That – that wasn't possible. The computer wasn't supposed to work that way. Any communication off the island was impossible… it must be his people, a trick. But there the simple word was.

_Is there someone there?_

Carefully he typed an answer. _Who is this?_

_Who is this?_ The unknown person responded.

_I asked you first. _Fox answered, his mind swirling around, shouldn't he call someone? This had to be a trick.

_My name is Frederic Phelps. Where are you?_

Fox stared at the name, like he had heard it before; but he knew it wasn't one of his people. Surely a trick, just a trick.

_I'm on an island. _

He waited for a response.

_You are on the island? Are you a survivor of flight 815?_

Fox blinked. The music had stopped. He inhaled deeply.

_Yes. Where are you?_

There wasn't an answer for what felt like an eternity. He started to sweat and wondered what the hell he was doing.

_I'm on a freighter._

"Fox, what are you up to?" Owen stood in the entrance with a raised eyebrow. She saw how stressed he looked and walked towards him quickly.

"Eh… err." Fox wondered how he was supposed to cover up the computer.

Owen leaned in over his back. "Staring at an empty screen? Sure must be fun. By the way Rosalie just came. She wants to bribe us or something. Come!" She dragged him up, he wasn't that heavy. And as he stumbled after her he thought it was lucky the messages had disappeared.

--

"You'll bribe us to change shift with the two lovebirds?" Owen asked in disbelief.

"Margo and Zidler yes." Rosalie tried to look calm and secure. But her eyes flickered across the hatch and she felt anxious. The whole underground base with the impending doom hanging over it wasn't really her thing.

"So what do we get?"

Rosalie was still looking across the hatch. "Anything you want from Sawyer's other secret stash."

"Excellent!" Owen clapped her hands together. "Still, I don't know what's in it for you. Why do you want them to be here in the hatch?"

"I let you take everything from Sawyer's secret stash if you just _go_!"

As Owen took Fox's arm and they left down the tunnel, Rosalie promised that she would make it up to Sawyer somehow as she followed them.

"Why isn't anyone stopping that alarm?" Hurley asked Wendy and they realized they were alone in the hatch.

--

Zidler was slightly alarmed himself when Owen sweetly said it was his time to take a shift in the hatch. She said it sweetly. Owen never said things sweetly.

He was more alarmed as he saw Rosalie cast him and Margo weird, smug glances all the time and as he made his way through the jungle, even it acted weirdly and he didn't fall over anything not once!

It all was explained when he saw Margo banging the hatch door while looking out of her mind.

"WHY DON'T YOU OPEN?"

"Margo?" he said carefully. She turned around and he was glad she didn't punch him. It looked like she was mad enough to do so. What was going on with her? Margo didn't get angry… well, not the first Margo he met.

"Zidler," she breathed. "I have to get into the hatch. It's my shift."

Zidler walked up to the door and pulled it open; he looked at Margo who blushed furiously. "Didn't you try to open it?"

"Oh… I assumed it was locked." Suddenly she looked all distant again. And instead of feeling irritated, he began to worry. She was acting so strange.

He entered the hatch she ran up to his side. "What are you doing here?" He was surprised by the sudden gentleness in her voice. She had just been screaming and kicking.

"It's my shift too." Zidler frowned. Rosalie seemed all angelic but she really was quite cunning.

"Oh." Margo suddenly blushed again but Zidler didn't see it. He was too busy staring at the hatch's mural and feeling panicked. "Guess it's just the two of us then?"

"Oh, right." Zidler turned to Margo. He felt awkward. He usually didn't feel awkward around Margo, but since her asthma attack and him shouting at her things between them hadn't been so good. He wished he had a time machine so he could go back and smack himself over the head so he wouldn't have done that. He needed to talk to Fox about that. He had to have some kind of an idea about time travel.

"Hello? Is there someone there?"

Wendy gaped and then she smiled when she saw them. "Zidler, Margo!"

"Hey, Wendy, what are you doing here?" Margo's voice was all of a sudden very high-pitched.

"I and Hurley are in charge of all the food here –"

"Food?" Margo squeaked. "Can I have some?"

"Um, Hurley's a bit tense about that…"

Margo was already gone on the hunt after food.

Wendy chuckled. "She sure is hungry."

"Yeah." Zidler smiled. "We're here to push the button… not that I understand why four people have to do that."

"Well apparently some people think me and Hurley are incapable of doing two things at once so…" Wendy looked confused. "What was that?"

Zidler looked up at the tunnel and he heard steps echo against the walls. Suddenly an image of cows running through the hatch flashed across his mind and he hid behind Wendy.

His mouth went dry and he saw how two people came running his way, carrying a stretcher between them. They stopped and stared at them.

"Where's the doctor?" the black man asked him

Wendy gasped and her eyes were on the man they were carrying on the stretcher.

It was Boone, and he was dying.

----

When Zidler was seven his Uncle Richard Malkin bought him his first magic set and Zidler had then declared his undying loyalty and something about knights and kings to him as a thank you. He had been obsessed with the old legends of magic and King Arthur when he was a little child.

But it was something with the fact that it was his Uncle that had first sent the potential in him and sort of sent him on the right path that made the Malkin family his favorite relatives, who cared about English people if you had an Australian family right?

Well, Aunt Joyce was a bit nutty with her whole zealot thing and all, but she was really nice and their daughter Charlotte was one of Zidler's best friends, and also his cousin. They always did the most ridiculous pranks all the time, even though none of them were ten anymore and far older than twenty they couldn't help but become like two children when they were together.

And she was dead.

And then she wasn't dead.

It was very strange. He had just sat in his old room at his parent's room; staring at the wall he painted _purple_ in a moment of madness for hours only to receive the news that Charlotte wasn't dead at all.

And then just a few hours later he was sitting on a plane on his way to Australia.

"Can you stop that?" the man sitting next to him grunted and Zidler looked embarrassed and put away his cards.

"I'm sorry… I'm just really nervous; you see my cousin was in this horrid near-death kind of experience…"

"Can you stop talking?

"I've tried sir, but all the doctors say it's an impossibility."

The girl at his other side giggled as the man growled and put on headphones. Zidler beamed at her. She was pretty with messy blonde hair and light blue eyes and her smile really was genuine even though she had a worried expression on her face.

"You're funny." She blushed at her words and looked away.

"It's a gift!"

A stewardess came to hand out the food and it was really awkward as he tried to manage a plastic fork squished in between the two of them. In the end he gave up and stared at the cold chicken like it was his worst enemy.

"So," the girl at his side said, she did manage to eat the food though, "near-death experience?"

That was a way to break the ice.

Zidler nodded. "Um, yes."

"What happened?"

"She drowned in a river. Was assumed dead until she woke up… next day."

The girl looked confused. "How could she have been assumed dead?"

Zidler shrugged. "I didn't get the details. I just took the first best flight so I could visit her."

"Poor thing." The girl honestly looked sympathetic. "It must be awful for her."

Zidler cleared his throat. "I just hope she's okay now. So…" He wanted to change the subject. "Why are you going to Australia?"

"My friend… she's on a rehab, in Sydney apparently." She took a deep breath. "We had this... falling out, and I haven't talked to her in a long time. I was hoping to see here again, you know? It's kind of stupid. Everyone tells me I'm an idiot for hunting her down like this, that she doesn't deserve it… but she's my best friend, I promised myself to look after her, despite whatever she did. So I just… I _have_ to." She blushed deeper. "Maybe I am an idiot. Here I am spilling all my thoughts out on you, sorry."

"I don't think you're an idiot. But I have only known you for like two minutes so…" He smiled to show he was joking.

Her name was Cassie, she made the rest of the flight bearable and just like him she rambled_, a lot._

As they arrived at the airport they clumsily shook each other's hands.

"I hope you find your friend."

"I hope you find your… um, I hope your cousin's okay."

"I hope so too," he whispered to himself.

----

"Hey – Sun have you seen Jack?" Sun looked curiously at Wendy who was jumping on the spot.

"I think he's checking up on Aaron… Wendy what's the matter?"

Wendy rushed past Sun and saw the doctor leaning over the cradle. Claire pulled her hair back and smiled at something he said.

"Jack!" Wendy shouted and almost threw herself on him in the rush. Hurley came up panting behind her.

"Wendy – Hurley, what's going on?" He frowned in concern.

Wendy held her stomach as she breathed and little baby Aaron started to wail. Claire took up her son in her arms and stared at Wendy.

Hurley leaned on Wendy who almost fell over. "It's – it's the hatch. Boone he's –"

"Boone, you found Boone?" Claire sounded slightly hysterical. "Is Brian there?"

Wendy shook her head. "No, no, Jack, there are other survivors – they brought him I don't know much they just yelled at me to get _you_. He's at the hatch Jack, and it's bad."

"Did you just say other survivors?"

"Yes – I don't know. Jack just_ go_."

--

Brian still hadn't woken up. He was tied up against a tree. The rope Ana-Lucia had gotten from Shannon's insane packing. It was tight around his bare chest and the skin was red and sore where the rope closed in.

Ana still held the gun in her hand. After much arguing she had let Andrea and Eko try to find the hatch and help Boone. No one had said it out loud, but Ana knew what Andrea was thinking when their eyes met for a moment.

_Don't let another one die too. _

"Please, Ana."

Libby kneeled in front of her and she looked torn. "Let us go back. Ellie, Lalita – they want to go back to their family. I want to go back."

Ana met her eyes and didn't say anything.

"The body."

They both turned around and saw Lori lean against a tree. Her eyes as always distant and her tone was dry.

"Shannon's body. It needs to be at peace."

Ana sighed and glanced at the man, Brian's tied up form. "Fine," she growled. "Libby, Lori, take the body with you."

"What about the rest of us?"

Ana stared at the girl who came with the boy and Shannon. Her name was Claret. She'd almost passed out when Ana fired her gun the second time. She had tried to explain to Andrea and Eko on how to get to the hatch.

"They go."

Libby didn't need to help Lori locate the body. They left clumsily and Ana watched as they disappeared from her view.

_Don't let another one die too._

--

"Hey Claire."

Claire gazed up at Rosalie and she looked down at her with concern. Claire looked almost hysterical and was twisting her hands while mumbling to herself. She sat inside her shelter next to Aaron's crib.

"Claire – why are you acting like Claret?"

Claire threw her hands up in the air and talked very quickly. "What do you mean? Do you mean I'm looking strange? I'm not looking strange. I'm just sitting. Yeah, sitting, I don't know a thing about anything. Okay? I'm sitting."

Rosalie wondered if everyone was going crazy.

"Sitting is fine. It's not like everyone sits. Jack's always running – not that I know a thing about Jack. Neither does Wendy or Hurley. Nope, no one does. Sitting… just sitting."

"Claire," Rosalie said calmly, "when was the last time you slept?"

"I'm sitting."

"I know that."

"Um… I think it was when Owen was… um…"

"Do you want me to take Aaron for a while?"

Claire sighed. "Please."

As Rosalie took the boy in her arms memories flooded inside her mind. Her daughter. So little, so fragile in her arms and how she had sworn, sworn to protect the child at any cost. No wonder Claire almost didn't sleep, of course the child would cry and keep her up at impossible times – but she was also afraid that if she didn't watch over him every single second something would happen to him.

Rosalie understood that. It hurt. She really missed talking to Sawyer and Bonnie, she already missed Shannon.

"Sean," she said and walked up to him by his own shelter. He was playing around with a golf club.

"Hey Rosalie, and hey baby Aaron." He smiled and tested to swing the club.

Aaron yawned to show how interesting he found Sean.

"Sean, I was wondering if you have any idea when Bonnie, Sawyer and Allen are going to be back?"

"Sorry Rosie, but I really have no idea. I bet Sawyer will run back any day soon, probably fretting about your safety."

Rosalie laughed. "Yes maybe."

Sean suddenly stopped in mid-swing and gaped at something behind her. Rosalie swirled around.

"FIRE!" Dom shouted and Rosalie saw Claire's shelter go up in flames.

--

Jack met her eyes and the weight of everything that had happened to both of them crashed down on him. The plane, the crash, the survival. And he let himself panic, drown in her eyes.

_1… 2… 3… 4… 5._

They worked together perfectly. She knew what everything was and she knew how to help Boone, she just didn't have the resources before.

He remembered her name. Andrea.

"We need to cool him down."

They put him in the shower and Andrea turned around at the crowd watching.

"You two," she said in a demanding manner, "get some alcohol, gauge patches and make sure the bed has clean sheets. This is not a preparation for a hot date. This is serious all right?"

Margo and Zidler nodded. Margo took a step to go away and found that Zidler was still nodding frantically. She grabbed his arm and they hurried off. Libby opened her mouth to say something, protest – ask a question but Andrea's glare made her follow after them to.

Andrea searched Jack's gaze. "I'll get the Ofloxacin."

The beeping sound began of the timer going down, Jack looked at the entrance but Andrea had already rushed off. He saw the man with the stick stand there.

"Could you, uh, go to the room with the computer and type in 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42 and press execute?"

The man, if he found Jack's order any strange didn't show it, but merely nodded and left.

--

"Clean sheets, clean sheets…"

"Give it to me."

Margo changed the sheets quickly and Zidler was jumping on the spot. Margo frowned.

"Zidler why are you jumping?"

"I don't know," he answered truthfully.

"Coming through!"

Zidler stepped to the side and Jack gently laid Boone down on the bed. Zidler looked away. He looked even worse now if it was possible.

"It's too crowded in here."

They took the hint and they left the room, when they reached the kitchen area Zidler stopped jumping and turned to look at Margo. Her lips were shivering and she looked very pale.

"Hey," he said calmly even though he had never felt so stressed, "it's going to be okay."

Margo looked like she wanted to scream at him, but instead she pulled him into a hug.

Zidler gaped shocked at the sudden embrace. She held him tightly and while barely realizing what they were doing he pulled his arms around her and hugged her back. They stood so for a while. Both terrified and guilty for not being any help, a man dying in the other room and all they could think about was them. How scared they were. How traumatized they were.

But Zidler hugged her mostly because he wanted her to know how much she meant to him.

"Hello? Jack?"

Margo didn't pull away from the hug at first but then she slowly loosened her grip around him and they both walked towards the sound of the voice.

"Lori?" Margo whispered. Lori's face was grim and the woman helping her carry Shannon was sobbing.

It was Shannon. But it wasn't really her. Because the Shannon they all knew was always so full of life, snarky, beautiful, the other part of Rosalie – with more stunning clothes.

This Shannon was just pale and dead.

----

"Hey Aunt Joyce."

As soon as Zidler arrived in front of the Malkin house she had pulled him into a bone-crushing hug. He embarrassedly patted her back and tried to free himself. She held him even closer.

"Oh Zidler, it's so good to see you again!"

She looked surprisingly well for someone who had just lost and gotten back her daughter. Her eyes shone wildly and she looked at him up and down.

"You're so gangly." She frowned.

"_Montgomery Prometheus Zidler!_"

This was bad. Really bad. No one used his mother's and father's horrid sense of humor and said his full name if it wasn't bad.

His Uncle, Richard Malkin stormed towards them and he was furious.

"Montgomery Prometheus!"

Zidler winced. He wasn't used to have his Uncle mad at him, and he had just arrived! What could he possibly have done?"

"Why did you come here?"

"Richard…" Joyce pleaded.

"Not now Joyce. Why did you come here Montgomery Prome –"

"You're overusing my name Uncle." Zidler tried to make himself sound cheerful, it wasn't working. "The effect isn't that big after the hundredth time."

His uncle scowled. "_Monty_ then, why did you come here?"

Zidler was now even more confused. "I came here to see Charlotte of course."

"You shouldn't have done that!"

"She almost died!" Zidler yelled. What was the matter with the world? What was the matter with his Uncle? His Uncle adored him. He didn't… shout at him, that much. "I had to come here and see if she's okay, okay?"

"And what gave you the permission to do that? Where do you expect to stay?"

"Here of course." It was Joyce, she looked small next to her husband's wrath but her voice was still steady. "Now, Richard don't be so upset, it's his cousin, of course he should be allowed to see her."

His Uncle looked like he was fighting an inner battle, in the end he growled, "Fine."

Joyce sighed as her husband went inside the house and slammed the door behind. She looked apologetic at Zidler. "He's been very tense; Charlotte's miracle was hard on him. He's having trouble accepting it."

"Miracle?"

Joyce thankfully took one of his bags and they walked up to the porch.

"Oh yes," she was smiling. "Charlotte was dead. But the Lord brought her back to life."

----

"Keep the child away from the fire!" Dom yelled and held Rosalie back. Rosalie stuttered and stared at the Claire's burning place. Aaron was crying loudly in her ear but she didn't care.

"Claire –"

"Rosalie damn it stay away!"

Hurley took her shoulder gently and they both stood silent as they watched the inferno. Rosalie tried to see what was going on. Who were safe? She didn't see Claire anywhere.

She blinked. There she was. Owen was carrying the girl and Claire was bleeding, her face sooty and Owen was screaming at her, maybe trying to wake her up.

Hurley left her side to help throw water so that the fire wouldn't spread. All Rosalie could do was to hold Aaron hard and watch as Sean and Owen desperately tried to patch his mother up.

"No… no…" Rosalie whirled around and met Fox's eyes that flickered from the fire to Aaron to Claire. "No… not the – them…"

"Was it the others?" Rosalie shrieked and Aaron cried harder. "It was them!"

Fox just shook his head and stared at Claire.

Then suddenly Rosalie heard Kate scream something a name, and she went into the flames without hesitation. Rosalie took a step forward automatically – to stop her, anything. Why would someone throw themselves at the fire?

"KAYLEE!" Dom screamed and suddenly she understood.

"Take – take Aaron." She handed the baby over to Fox who was still mumbling to himself and she ran towards the chaos. She began to cough and her eyes got filled with tears and the heat slammed against her face like a wall.

Claire's shelter hadn't been big, but it was spreading and was just one giant ball of fire. She tried to go in but the heat kept her away and hands held her back. Horrified the survivors waited.

And then Kate and Kaylee came out. Kate was red with blisters over her hands and face but Kaylee looked so much worse. Dom took Kaylee in his arms and all she could do was _watch_.

"Someone has to get Jack," she said.

--

Brian blinked and the depressing world met him once again.

"You're awake." A woman sat on her knees before him. Gun in her hand.

Gun.

_Shannon._

"NO!" he yelled and tried to move towards her. He wanted to take his hands and put them around her neck. He wanted to grab the gun from her and put it to her temple. He wanted to hurt her until she forgot what happiness was.

Shannon was dead. It was that woman's fault.

"Brian…" Claret's voice was soothing, like she was talking to a child and he felt her hand against his cheek.

"Step away from him."

Claret shunned away from him and he heard her stutter excuses. He closed his eyes. He was out again.

Small glimpses of time he was awake and then he woke for real.

Brian blinked and saw that there were several people surrounding him. There was of course Claret who looked like she was on the edge of fainting. A little girl who looked away and held a tall woman's hand and by their side an old man stood. Sitting on the ground with her legs crossed was a girl; he thought that she was pretty even though she looked so scared.

"Jin," he said weakly. "Nice to see you again."

Jin looked down at the ground.

He faced the killer again. "Let them go. They are not a part of this. This is between us. Just let them go."

She stared at him and he saw how her fingers rested on the trigger. He inhaled sharply. Thought for one moment she would shoot him.

"You can leave."

It was like they had all held their breaths as they all exhaled in relief. He saw the ghost of a smile on the old man's lips, but they didn't leave just yet. They didn't know the way. They looked at Claret.

"You heard her. Leave!"

Claret jumped and motioned for them to follow.

"Come on sweetie," the woman said to the little girl. The girl bit her lip, and then she ran forward and hugged Ana from behind. She whispered something before she rushed back to the group and they wandered away deeper into the jungle.

"Between us huh?"

Brian curled his lips up in a cruel smile. "Yes. See, you did not just kill Shannon. You are also killing my best friend."

"So you want to kill me?"

"No. What good would that do? I want something entirely else."

--

"He needs to take the pills. Boone, come on, swallow them."

Andrea held out the water and both she and Jack tried to force the pills down his throat. It didn't seem to do much good and they were both getting more and more frustrated.

"You're being too inconsiderate."

Libby sat down by Boone's side and pulled him up so he was sitting, leaning against her.

"May I?" She took the water and the pills and stroked Boone's hair out of his face gently.

"Boone," she whispered. "Boone you have to take these pills. You have to swallow them; you want to get better right? So… swallow it. Okay, good, good."

Jack wondered how she, who didn't even know him, could help him and calm him down so much.

"They didn't teach the whole whisper-in-the-ear thing in med school," he said.

"They didn't do that in mine either." She helped Boone lay down and looked at Andrea. "Is he going to be all right?" she asked in a whisper.

Jack wasn't comfortable discussing it so close to Boone. "Yes," he said simply. Andrea cast him a quick glance and he knew she knew that Boone's life was coming to an end.

"Hey… Jack?"

Jack turned around and saw Lori and for the first time really looked at her since she returned with Shannon. Her brown hair seemed longer and her arms were colored with blue bruises, and she looked fragile.

She had always looked weak somehow, her eyes never seeing, her skin so pale and then she was so short. But that didn't matter because he knew, everyone knew Lori was strong. But now she looked as if she was going to fall apart.

He didn't picture their reunion like this. Not that he pictured it often – but their reunion had taken place at other places. On a ship on their way for rescue, on the mainland with big building and the sound of cell phones clicking and in each one of them Lori would be smiling. Because they had been rescued.

Instead they were here, and everything he had wanted to say didn't matter.

"Yes?"

"If – when he wakes up – we should remove the body."

Jack looked past her at the couch where Shannon laid. A blanket pulled over her body but he could see the top of her blonde head.

"Yeah, um…" He needed Andrea; Libby seemed to be a valuable resource. Lori had been a nurse too. "Can you ask Margo and Zidler to do it?"

"They won't do it. That's why I can ask them, otherwise I wouldn't." Lori left to search after the two and he felt Andrea's gaze burn into the back of his head.

"Was that his sister?"

"Shannon – yes."

_He will be joining her soon,_ he thought.

--

"We should help them somehow." Margo leaned on Zidler's shoulder. They sat in two chairs they had pulled into the tunnel, unable to stay – unable to walk away. They had sat like that for a while, without saying a word.

"What can we do?"

"One thing actually." Lori stalked towards them, hands on her hips. "We got to get the body back to the beach."

Margo gasped and Zidler stood up, making Margo almost fall to the floor in the process. "We?"

"And in 'we' I mean you."

"Um…" The thought of taking Shannon's corpse back to the camp, all the way through the jungle… staring at her… she was _dead_.

"No." Margo stared at the wall across the tunnel, whispering to herself. "No. I can't do this… not now… _I can't_."

And she took off before Zidler managed to say something, stop her maybe. She couldn't run away, she couldn't.

"I can take the body back."

It was that man with the creepy stick, full with words from the bible and stuff. Lori nodded and Zidler stood on the spot, he didn't know what to do.

"Why are you staying here for?" Lori snapped. "Go after her you moron." The words were unkind but her voice shivered.

Zidler just wanted to discover that all of it was just a bad dream.

----

His Uncle's bad mood was always present in the house and all the things Zidler had loved about visiting his relatives was gone.

Aunt Joyce was determined that it was a miracle that made Charlotte, sort of go from dead to living, while his Uncle was sure that she had just went into a stage of hypothermia and there was nothing to worry about, but he was worried. He always had a frown on his face and he spent more and more time locked inside his room, Zidler could hear him mumble about some kind of flight and he kept making phone calls and getting hung up on.

Most of all, his Uncle was worried about Zidler. Not his daughter but _him_. Like he expected Zidler to drop dead or something. It made Zidler edgy whenever he was around his Uncle.

He knew his Uncle was a fraud, the whole psychic business he kept going, his father had told him that when he was a child. But sometimes Zidler wasn't sure. Uncle Richard sometimes just knew stuff. And he acted to strange.

But not as strange as Charlotte.

When Zidler saw Charlotte when he first arrived, he had been happy to see her sitting by the window in her room, alive, breathing.

But all the colors seemed to have drained from her, her face was pale as a ghost and her hair was uncombed and she looked smaller and bonier than before. She looked so weak like it hurt for her to breath and when she looked at him she screamed. She just screamed right out and Joyce rushed to her side and tried to calm her down.

The next day though, she sat down beside him on the couch in the living room, smiled and apologized for acting so strange yesterday. And that was one of those rare moments Zidler noticed – that she was actually _present _and herself.

Most of the times she also locked herself inside her room and mumbled while her parents fought and she ignored any tries to conversation with her cousin.

And other times she was just plain crazy.

"Hey, hey…" he said calmly as she rocked back and forth on her bed. Face buried in her hands and the shouts form his Uncle and Aunt piercing through the walls, "It's okay… it's okay…"

She whispered, "My father is lying."

Zidler didn't know what to say, he put an arm around her and hoped she would stop.

"He's lying Zidler… he's a liar… he just lies."

"What does he lie about then?" Zidler asked in a low voice.

Charlotte looked up abruptly. "He knows what really happened, he knows I was _dead._"

"You weren't dead," Zidler said firmly. "Or you are a really pretty corpse."

Charlotte just stared.

"You don't understand!" she hissed. "He just lies so that you will go away."

Zidler pulled his arm away. "Charlotte…"

"He does that, my father he lies to everyone. He lies to that pregnant girl, he lies to mom and he lies to you. He thinks he's going to make you go away and I don't want you to! You will get hurt, really hurt Monty. So hurt you will never ever recover because it won't be a wound on your body that can be healed it will be in your _heart!_ You will go away and I will never see you again!"

"Char, I'm not going anywhere."

Charlotte looked like she was going to cry and she started to rock back and forth again. "Yes you are. You're going to go away, and then I'm never going to see you again and father, father wants it to happen. I scream at him but he refuses to listen. Do you understand that? He wants you to go, he wants you to raise _it_, he wants you to leave and he wants you to disappear and then we'll never see each other again –"

"Charlotte."

Zidler looked up, in the doorway Richard Malkin stood and he was clearly avoiding Zidler's gaze.

"Charlotte, that's enough. I have to talk to you."

Charlotte stood up but swayed on the spot. "You are a liar!"

His Uncle clenched his teeth and rudely grabbed Charlotte's arm. Zidler stood up and was about to protest but then Joyce came up behind them and the look she gave him told him not to.

Charlotte continued to scream as her father dragged her away.

----

The smoke was still heavy and the glow of the fire was still left. As they heaved more water on the last burning flames the smoke grew even thicker and she let out a cough.

Owen stood outside what had just been burning with her arms crossed and with her lips tightly closed. Kaylee was bad, really bad and Jack was off to the hatch, in a moment of panic Hurley had told them all about Boone, but Wendy had already been sent off to get him.

Claire was also bad, and Aaron didn't seem to be able to stop crying.

"The raft has to come!" she heard someone cry from afar.

"Who do you think did it?"

Of all the people, Charlie had to ask her that question, but well she wanted to share her theories.

"Aliens, big bad cowboy space aliens."

Charlie glared. "I can't believe you. You're making jokes after your closest friend almost burned up!"

Owen looked down. "So what do you think Driveshaft? That it was the others?"

"Yes! I believe they wanted to kill her – us!"

Owen snickered. "Kill us? If they wanted us dead they would have done it already. You have no idea how they work."

"And you do?"

Owen stood silent for a while.

"I'm going to check up on my closest friend."

--

"So that's your plan?"

"Yes."

"And you're telling it to the person who just shot your friend?"

"Who murdered my best friend's sister yes."

Ana-Lucia blinked. "Why?"

"Because you now got the chance to get some redemption," Brian told her. "You killed one of the siblings; you can maybe save the other. But you have to untie me first. I'm not into the whole bondage thing."

"What if you kill me?"

Brian chuckled darkly. "You want to die anyway. So what does it matter?"

Ana put her hands on her head and tried to think. She pulled out the knife and watched it for a while before she cut the ropes around Brian. He helped himself free and winced as he touched his sore skin. He took a step closer to her and she one step back.

Brian laughed again. "If you are so afraid of me then why did you let me go?"

"To save him."

"Yes, to save Boone."

--

"I'm sorry." Margo ran through the jungle. "I'm sorry!"

"I'll forgive you if you would just slow down…"

Margo abruptly halted and Zidler darted right into her back. They both fell over.

"Um... Zidler?"

"Yeah?"

"Could you get off me?"

"Sure."

They sat up awkwardly. Margo had twigs in her light brown hair and Zidler gently took them out.

"She's dead."

That was a really good way to interrupt the silence.

"Yes," he answered simply. There was nothing else to say. No way to cheer her up, to way to make himself try to joke it away. Shannon was dead. The horrid truth of that statement could eat them both up, swallow all their hopes and happiness if they let it. He refused to.

He handled death in one way, well didn't handle it in one way, and that was to ignore it. Not to think about it. But it was hard. Shannon, who had always been so alive, she lived more than all of them somehow, laughed more and breathed more. Now she was just gone.

"Zidler," Margo said carefully, "you know you just said your thoughts out loud?"

Zidler blinked.

"Just kidding."

Maybe he wasn't the only one who didn't handle death.

----

Zidler had gotten a call from his boss who said he had a private show he was to give back in Los Angeles and that he had to do it; otherwise his boss would perform a trick involving chainsaws with Zidler as an assistant and promised that he would be drunk that day – so Zidler didn't really have a choice. But he didn't want to leave Charlotte; she was still really weak even though she was getting better.

"No, no." Charlotte shook her head and she looked scared. "No, Monty you have to go."

Zidler was sure she just wanted to do what was best for him. But he wasn't going to give up that easily. And wasn't it Charlotte who had been begging him to stay before? "I'm staying."

"No you're not."

"Yes I am."

"No you're not!"

"_Yes I am_."

Charlotte's eyes flared. "You're such a whacker."

Zidler grinned. "Yes but a hilarious one."

He treasured that moment, when Charlotte was nagging at him and actually showing emotions instead of eerily silence and creepy stares; now she looked human, scowling and crossing her arms. He wasn't going to leave now when she was showing progress.

Charlotte's face grew still and all the emotions flooded from it. Zidler had to restrain himself from starting to shake her and scream at her to come back, but she just stood up and went to the window and looked out.

"Charlotte?" Zidler said weakly.

Charlotte was shaking her head and in swift movements she rushed to the door and down the stairs. Zidler sighed and put his head in his hands. He suddenly felt awfully tired.

"Father, I'm afraid it's not a very good time." Zidler opened his eyes and heard the voices come from outside, he looked out the open window Charlotte had been peering out from and saw Joyce running to greet someone who had to be the priest.

"You'll have to come back later."

Charlotte was at the porch and that weird eerily feeling went through him again. Maybe she'd rushed to greet him, but it appeared the priest just got there, how did she know?

"Mrs. Malkin, I must speak to your daughter." The priest had a low but strong voice and his accent wasn't Australian. "Yesterday in the church you said that..."

Joyce's voice was stressed, "I know what I said. It's just that right this minute is not a very good time."

"Get back in the house, Joyce. Get her inside."

Uncle Richard stepped out from the house, even Zidler from above could see he was mad. Joyce led her daughter in and Zidler turned away from the mirror. He had to talk with Charlotte.

----

They began to walk back to the beach again, after they had been silent, alone with their thoughts for a long time.

"I'm sorry for being such a complete jerk to you," Margo blurted out.

"What?" Zidler was confused. "I thought it was I who did the bad thing."

Margo looked amused. "No, it was I who ignored you and was mad at you for no reason."

"Yes but I did yell at you in front of everyone…"

Their discussion had to stop as Margo took out one of her inhalers. They were both reminded of that time, the turning point.

"Let's agree that it was both our faults."

Zidler nodded. "I'm fine with that."

"And that we should from now on just be friends like before right?"

"Right," Zidler said before he realized what he had just agreed on. Just friends… like before. Oh no.

Margo smiled, and it was an earnest smile. "I have to admit something. I was… jealous."

A spark of hope fluttered in his chest. "Jealous?"

"Of you and Wendy. You… well, I hate to admit this to you and myself, but you are my first real friend. It's embarrassing but true." She blushed. "I've never had this person – except for my sister that I could really trust, laugh with and be, you know be just friends with. I was kind of afraid that Wendy would somehow take all of that away."

Just friends. He hated that phrase. It should be banned.

"But now I know you'll stand by me. And just so you know – I think Wendy likes you too!"

Wait… Wendy, liking….

Life was a mess.

Shannon's smile flashed through his mind.

Life was fragile.

--

"He's going to die."

"We're going to make everything as comfortable as possible," Jack said like he had said a hundred of times before.

Lori sighed and Jack glanced into the room Boone laid in. Andrea was sitting by his side but when she saw him looking at her she walked over to them.

"I'm really sorry," she said honestly. "We never meant for any of this to happen. We just… it was a mistake."

She wasn't talking about Boone only.

"We understand that," Jack said gently. Libby and Andrea had told them the whole story of their time on the island, with comments from Lori of course who also told him about Flor, Walt and Michael. And there was so much going on. Not only were one of them dead and another one dying – but now two of them had been kidnapped, just like before and they had to do something about it. But now didn't seem like a good time to organize a search party.

It comforted him slightly that Sawyer, Allen and Bonnie hopefully had found some kind of trace, some clue about the others, but hell, they could be dead for all he knew.

"Jack!"

Wendy rushed into the room, looked around at the strangers and stared at them in a daze.

"Wendy," Lori said and smiled without any joy, "nice to hear you again."

Wendy pulled herself together but her gaze was now on Boone in the other room. "Jack… there's trouble at the beach."

"What kind of trouble?"

"Fire, there was a fire and Claire and Kaylee were in it."

Why was it that Wendy always gave him the bad news?

--

"Wha…"

"That's the most beautiful almost 'what' I've ever heard."

Claire blinked. Her lips were awfully dry and her throat even more, it hurt to try to make out words but she had to. "What's going on?"

"I guess those weird plants Sun gave us worked."

"Owen?" Claire's whole body felt numb and she tried to see through the blur her head throbbed with pain.

"I'm here."

"What…"

"… The hell is going on? Quite funny story actually. Your shelter was on fire."

Claire winced. "I burned up?"

"Don't be silly. You didn't burn, not a little. Actually, what happened was that Kaylee ran in and got you out and then you both fell and hit your heads on your bed and well, got knocked out."

"That is silly." Claire moved her hand up to her face to rub her eyes, and discovered her skin was red with blisters, she bit her lip to hold back the moan of pain and suddenly, how she could've forgotten she didn't know, "Aaron?"

--

Ana-Lucia sneaked into the door and stepped loudly through the tunnel. She made her presence known quickly.

"Ana?" Libby looked surprised at her from a chair. Ana looked around quickly. A kitchen, she had seen a room with a computer, she already knew this place.

"Hey Libby," Ana said without a shiver.

"It's you."

"Nice to see you too Lorraine."

There didn't seem to be any other people there in the hatch. Ana frowned and gazed at the walls and her eyes found Boone lying in another room. She smirked slightly and then turned around and faced them.

"Where is everyone?"

"What are you doing here?" Lori snapped. "Where's Brian? Everyone else?"

"I let them go," Ana answered simply and trailed her fingers across the table.

"Where?"

"Back to your camp. Weren't you supposed to save that kid?"

Lori closed her fist and she was shivering with restrained anger. "We _are_."

"No, we aren't." Libby sighed. "The truth is that we can't save him, there were some trouble at the beach and the doctor, Jack and the others went there. We stayed behind."

"Doesn't it feel great to be left behind?" Ana-Lucia smiled and walked backwards, glancing at the bookshelf and the stack of records. Lori and Libby followed after her.

Lori made a sound that apparently was supposed to resemblance a growl. "I wasn't left behind. Someone had to watch Libby!"

Libby's eyes widened slightly, but then she nodded. "They don't know us yet. But I can assure you Lori that I won't do anything against –"

"Yeah, yeah." Lori interrupted her. "It's Ana I'm worried about."

"I feel flattered." Ana walked into the computer room and gazed up at the timer. "What does it do?"

Lori took a step forward. "End the world. Start of the apocalypse. I should warn you though; it's highly dangerous around bitchy Latinas."

--

"It hurts Kate it _hurts_."

Kaylee woke up too soon. She had been out for a while and they tried to patch her up but then she woke up. She woke up and she was screaming and sobbing at it broke her heart to see her friend in so much pain. And she was helpless, Kate knew she was helpless.

Sean found some kind of lotion to put on the burn wounds and they helped her hands a little but Kaylee just winced as it touched her skin. Sean was stronger than her and Dom and just put it on her skin despite her protests and moans.

But Kaylee was going to be okay, they understood that much. She was hurt but not that hurt, it looked worse because of all the soot but Kay was going to be okay. Kate kept repeating that so much it became like a chant.

It was just one thing.

"Dom – Dom," Kaylee cried and despite the fact that her hands were badly hurt she took his hand, "Dom why can't I move my legs?"

--

It was strange how they all left the dying man so willingly, like he didn't matter, or like he was already a lost cause. Brian sneaked by the kitchen, cast a glance at Ana-Lucia distracting Lori and that Libby chick and he rushed into the room Boone was in.

He was lying in the bunk bed. Sweating and mumbling with a bandage wrapped around his leg. Alone. He was freaking dying and no one was there to be with him. No one but him.

"Hey mate."

Boone didn't answer but Brian thought he saw his eyes move more quickly behind the eyelids. Brian sat down on his side.

"It's me Brian. Listen, we don't go much time. I'm going to try to save you. It will be risky, and will most likely not work and Jack will probably behead me after this but I got to try. If you agree to this, you agree to come with me and then stand by my side as they will hold me at the island court okay? Whatever I do you must trust me and listen to me. If you agree to these terms then mumble gibberish."

Boone mumbled gibberish.

"Great." Brian swung Boone's arm around his shoulder and with great effort made him stand up and they walked out of the room and through the tunnels. Well, Brian practically carried and dragged him.

He heard Ana chat with Lori. Her voice was still the same and no sign that she had helped Brian sort of kidnap his best friend. It was good to have a cop on his side.

A cop that had killed Shannon.

--

Rosalie stepped out of the tent and glanced at the smoke. Owen stood there again, staring at it like it held all her answers. Sean was talking intently with Locke, probably discussing the source of the fire.

Rosalie walked past them by the edge of the water. The waves crashed in on her feet and the sun blazed on her back. Last time she took a walk by the ocean she felt hopeful. Now she just felt like all hope had been wrenched out of her.

She shivered at the thought of the flames around Claire's shelter, the baby crying in her arms and how helpless she felt. That feeling she used to have a lot. But some people made it go away more often, like her wife, Sawyer and Shannon. She missed them all terribly.

She heard Charlie shout, and then Sun yelled. She looked to her right and saw several survivors run over the beach and her gaze followed them and she saw a group of people emerging from the jungle.

She stopped breathing. Her heart skipped a beat.

And running towards her, like in a dream, she saw her wife.

She didn't know what she was doing. She just ran, grabbed her and held her and wished to never let go. Breathed to make sure it was real, tears falling down her face but she wasn't sad. She was alive. She was in her arms.

"I missed you! Oh, I missed you so much!"

They sobbed into each other and then Lalita laughed and her laugh was the most beautiful thing she'd ever heard she pulled away from their embrace and took Rosalie's face in her hands. They just looked at each other. Seeing the differences, every single tear. They had both changed. But their love still remained.

Lalita kissed her quickly as if she was afraid Rosalie would disappear then she hugged her again.

"I'm sorry," Lalita sobbed. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry Eva's gone."

--

Ellie held Kim's hand hard but Kim was greeted by loads of strangers all the time and finally she let go. She wondered where her father was. She couldn't see him. She walked around looking at all the adults and tried to find her father's face there. Where was he?

Someone took her hand and she looked up at that nice woman, Claret.

"Where's Daddy?" she asked sadly.

Claret had tears in her eyes. "He's on a very important mission. But he'll be back soon sweetheart I promise. I promise Ellie."

Ellie looked down. "Okay."

"Ellie?" A woman with long brown hair in a ponytail and hands wrapped in bandages stopped in her tracks and then her eyes widened. "Harwood?"

--

"Jin!" Sun yelled and actually tackled her husband to the ground. He laughed and they sat up and she kissed him. Charlie gave him two thumbs up but Jin was too busy looking at his wife to notice.

The past days had been confusing, chaotic but the weight on his shoulder from everything that had happened eased as he held his wife in his arms again. There were many questions that would be needed to be asked. Why the scent of smoke was heavy in the air for an example. But also answers he had to give, where Flor, Michael and Walt were.

But he didn't think about that as he kissed her again.

--

"So, Rose's husband is white. I didn't see that coming," Hurley said to Wendy. Wendy rolled her eyes and hugged the Asian chick.

"I'm Wendy," she said and beamed. And of course Hurley had seen Wendy smile many times before, but this time it felt like he recognized it – like it reminded him of someone else.

"Kimika!" the girl answered with a cheerful voice and before he knew it, she had pulled Hurley into a hug. Fox came up awkwardly, probably hoping to seek refugee from the hug-feast but Kim got to him first and sent a big smile his way.

"We – welco – come. Welcome." he stuttered and even Hurley had trouble to hear what he said. Kim looked confused at him before she smiled widely.

"You're the cute stuttering guy Fox!"

"Um…"

She pulled him into a hug. He looked blushed.

"C'mon," she teased him as Wendy laughed, "everyone's hugging!"

--

Sean saw as everyone greeted each other, reunited, smiled, cried and laughed. He found himself avoiding the embraces and the happiness and just looking. Looking after that familiar loud voice, that innocent beautiful face and that laugh that used to irritate him so much.

"Flor?" he asked and Jin shook his head.

"No… no Flor…" he looked solemn and it wasn't only Sean who noticed that someone was missing.

"Michael and Walt?" Sun asked.

Jin talked quickly in Korean and stroke Sun's face. Sun looked at Sean who somehow already knew that Flor wasn't going to run and hug him and chat happily and then run away again like she always did.

"They – they were taken."

--

"This is the worst and the best day ever."

Zidler sat down beside Margo by a fire that Owen had managed to get up. The survivors were all sitting by fires scattered across the beach, welcoming and getting to know the new survivors. Of course there were a lot of questions too and there was a knot in his stomach at the thought of Flor and Walt getting kidnapped, of Boone getting shot and of course of Shannon.

But he didn't really want to think about it right now. Not when everyone was so happy. He knew that soon they would all have to explain, and they had to tell everyone about the death. But as he glanced at Rosalie and Lalita talking to each other, finally together against all odds – he couldn't, no one could bring themselves to ruin the moment.

"The worst and the best huh?"

Margo nodded. "I made a list, of good and bad things that has happened today. And of course a lot – I mean _a lot_ of bad things have happened. But I think married couples getting reunited after thinking the other one was dead probably tops about everything."

Zidler glanced at the list. Shannon's death wasn't on it. It was too horrible to even write down, too unreal.

They sat in silence, watching the other survivors, glancing at the fire.

"When are we going to get rescued?" Margo's voice shivered and she had a look of fear in her eyes.

"I promise you we will get off this island, at least in the next three years."

Margo smiled. "I'll hold you to that promise."

----

"I'm leaving like you said," Zidler tried to keep his grin real, but he caught his face in the mirror and saw he came off more like creepy serial killer and closed his mouth.

"That's good… good." Charlotte looked down. They were alone in the hall. "I know I said I didn't want you to go because…"

"I would never come back? You know that's not going to happen right?" He assured his cousin.

Charlotte sighed and looked up. "I talked to father, and now I know you have to go." She managed a weak smile.

"You talked to Uncle Richard?" The look on Charlotte's face, it was the same look she had when she talked about afterlife – heaven and hell. It made him uneasy. "What did he say?"

"He explained it all to me. You have to go now Zidler. You have to take this flight…"

She had been holding something behind her back and now she held out a ticket. Zidler took it from her hand.

"Oceanic… flight 815?"

Charlotte nodded. "You have to go on that flight."

"But Char, that's today."

Charlotte looked at him sadly. "I know. But you have to."

"Okay." Zidler wondered if she expected him to run now, because he barely had any time and –

Charlotte hugged him. It was very sudden and he dropped the ticket.

"Zidler, you have to raise it," she whispered and then she pulled away from him, and her look was distant again but he still held her arms.

"What?"

"You'll know." She met his gaze. "You'll know when the time comes. Only you can take care of it. _Only_ you. Unfortunately that means you'll always be alone. I'm so sorry."

Zidler's last goodbyes were awkward. Charlotte ran up to her room as soon as she had said those cryptic words, Joyce was tearful because of the priests' depart and Uncle Richard's look was expressionless. But when he hugged Zidler he whispered a few words that Zidler would forget at first, but still somehow recall a long time later.

"Don't worry. You'll do a great job at it."

And a very puzzled Zidler nodded and closed the door behind him.

----

Rosalie was so utterly happy she thought her heart was going to burst. She sure hoped it wouldn't, that would be really disgusting and weird and she didn't really have time to slip into her mortal coil yet because she was now reunited with her wife.

Her wife.

Was alive.

No matter how many times she repeated it in her head she could actually believe it. She expected the beautiful woman at her side to disappear every time she looked away. So that's why she tried to look at her all the time. So she wouldn't.

"You are staring," Lalita observed. She herself was also staring. She didn't care. Rosalie leaned against Lalita's shoulder as she told her everything. Told her about the crash. About Eva up in the tree. About the hunt for food and the abductions. About Eva's abduction.

She cried sometimes in her story and Rosalie would cry with her. And though her wife was back at her side the hole after Eva was even bigger. But her daughter was out there, somewhere and that gave her strength and she reminded Lalita of that.

And Rosalie told her about losing the ability to walk. About Shannon and about Bonnie. Told her about her dreams and Claire's birth. Told her how much she loved her.

Rosalie looked out at the survivors. They were all sitting around fires, talking and getting to know each other. The events of the day still were present in their minds. The fire, Kaylee, Claire. But they forgot it for just one moment and let themselves be humans.

She glanced at the jungle and her eyes narrowed as she thought she saw something moving inside of it. She gasped when she saw an unknown man come out from the jungle. His face was full with sorrow and in his arms he carried someone, someone with dried blood on her clothes and a pale skin and closed eyes.

She screamed before she realized it was Shannon.

--

**Authors' Notes:** I don't know what's wrong with me, but I _can't stop writing. _It's like a disease! So expect fast updates and ridiculous long chapters to continue to come.

This was a chapter I had waited a long time to write and looked very much forward to, the Zidler flashback chapter! I hope it wasn't too confusing but enough confusing to make you maybe see hints at future events and Zidler's path on the island… um, did that make any sense? Go and theorize!

So, guessing game, who do you think will be the first one of the OCs to go?

Thank you all for reading this story.


	21. The Closed

So fitfully- so fearfully-  
Above the closed and fringed lid  
'Neath which thy slumb'ring soul lies hid,  
That, o'er the floor and down the wall,  
Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!

_Oh, lady dear, hast thou no fear?  
Why and what art thou dreaming here?  
Sure thou art come O'er far-off seas,  
A wonder to these garden trees!  
Strange is thy pallor! strange thy dress,  
Strange, above all, thy length of tress,  
And this all solemn silentness!_

- The Sleeper by Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 19, The Closed**

--

"Shannon Rutherford was… she was… She was very brave. She and I met here, on this very island… after the crash. She, she lit up my days – she kept me going. If it weren't from Shannon I don't know if I could've gone on. And now she's… she's gone. But, her spirit, her happiness and her joy of life will still be with me. I know you are in a better place. I love you."

"May she rest in peace." Jack took up a hand full of sand and poured it down over her grave. After him Sun and Jin, both holding hands poured one together and the survivors said goodbye to her quietly, one after one leaving.

The stars shone bright on the sky and there didn't seem to be a single cloud. The moon lit up the cross and the engraving on it and the two people still by its side.

Rosalie had cried and she had screamed and she felt like that if Lalita hadn't been holding her she would have fallen apart. Still now, when the ceremony was over and Shannon's body was deep down in earth she expected her to come up from behind, laugh, whine about Boone, comfort her when she was sad, and be _alive_.

"It was a beautiful speech."

Rosalie thought of Shannon sitting down by her side, not a word, nothing. How she was able to comfort her simply by being by her side.

"No it wasn't. Nobody could hear what I was saying since I was sobbing too much," Rosalie told her wife and dried away the tears with her sleeve. It just kept coming new ones.

Shannon was the only one who had looked her in the eyes at first. Maybe she was a bit scared, but she was still brave, stubborn and so wonderful.

Lalita looked at Rosalie tearfully. "They understood what you meant either way."

Rosalie squeezed her hand and smiled faintly. Lalita kissed her softly and then Rosalie bent to the ground. She took up a handful of dirt in her hand and poured it over the grave. The sand slipping through her fingers just like Shannon's life had slipped past her too.

She whispered, "Goodbye Shannon."

Rosalie's head flew up and Lalita made one fast move and stood before her. From the jungle there came noises, voices and soon three persons arrived.

"Sawyer!" Rosalie screamed and threw herself in his arms.

"Freaking holy mother of – Queenie you're walking!"

--

Andrea's gaze lay on the ruins if the shelter. It was like a stain on the wonderful illusion the survivors had built. Something wrong, that they here actually could get hurt. They were afraid of course, why wouldn't they be? They had all been in the crash, they were all human.

But none of them had felt like fear like they had. They hadn't been hunted like them.

"Hey Andy, fancy a piece of delicious mango?" Libby grinned and held it up under her nose. "I bet it tastes different on this side of the island."

"Not really hungry."

Libby looked sympathetically at her. "How are you feeling?"

Andrea met her gaze. "About what?"

"Boone."

Andrea looked away. She wanted to run; this was not a topic she wanted to discuss. But Libby with her all shrink stuff apparently thought it would be good for her to talk about, she didn't get why, she never knew Boone. "What about him?"

"He's gone."

"He's not gone," Andrea stared into the jungle. "His friend took him."

"And Ana helped him."

"Your point?" Andrea snapped at her.

"When you want to talk you know where I am." Libby walked over to Hurley's side and they strode together by the shoreline. Andrea glared and tried her hardest to feel mad at Libby but she couldn't. Libby just did that to people.

She glanced at the 'kitchen', some sort of dining table they'd built. It was almost funny; while Cindy was getting her head rotated they were feasting on boar _by a table_.

Andrea's eyes narrowed and se searched her jeans pockets, fishing up a note she'd been carrying for a long time.

"You!" Andrea grabbed the guy walking by her side. He spun around and almost fell. He caught himself in the last second and the girl by his side looked confused.

"Claire Littleton," Andrea said and ignored the last events, "isn't she that mom who was in the fire?"

--

"Hey Foxy!" Owen called. Fox, the clumsy bastard almost fell and she had to grab his arm to save him. "Your mother must have dropped you on the head. Just tell people that and everything will work out."

"Um…" Fox looked utterly confused.

Owen hooked her arm in his and they walked… well, she dragged him across the beach. He looked quite stunned. Which was totally understandable. He was indeed walking arm in arm with the famous Owen Chauncey.

"Before you start stammering like an idiot let me talk."

"Ab-bout what?"

Owen looked carefully around.

"Sawyer's out to get us. I know he's about to do something really evil or whatever to get back his stash. And it's obvious he's going to come after you. Because well," she measured him up and down, "anyway, you got to stay strong. Don't lose your head. Stay at the hatch or something; take Kim with you if you want to. Just don't let him get to you okay?"

Fox looked at her with wide eyes. He was probably amazed by her smartness. Then he blushed.

"Why wo-would I want t-to take Kim wi-with me?"

Oh dear. She rolled her eyes, released his arm and patted him on the back. "One day you'll know."

Fox stammered a bit more, said something that had to be goodbye and quickly walked into the jungle.

"Boo!"

Owen couldn't help but gasp and Sawyer chuckled when she swung around and faced him. Arrogant jerk.

"Did I scare you sweetheart?" Sawyer's lips curled up in that smirk she loathed so much. Why did he have to return? She'd hoped he would get eaten by a polar bear or something.

"What do you want Sawyer?" Better have it done with.

Sawyer's smirk was completely wiped off his face. "I want my stash back." He didn't bother to play around.

Owen threw her head back and laughed. "Your stash back? Sawyer – or should I say James?" Her smile grew bigger when she saw the utter shock in his face. "Yeah I know your real name. Anyway, I got it fair from Rosalie and I'm not interested in giving it back to you, I'm quite enjoying all the alcohol and the magazines."

"Then I'm just gonna take it from your tent."

Owen sighed and clapped his shoulder. "Since it's not there - good luck with that."

----

"_Run, rabbit run, Dig that hole, forget the sun… And when at last the work is done…"_

The books fell down to the floor with a bang. Owen swung around grabbed one of the books that hadn't fallen and threw it at the one who sneaked up on her.

"Ouch… sorry… I…"

Owen took up the lexicon again and began to punch the guy.

"Stop – stop it –"

Owen blew the hair out of her face. "What the hell are you doing? Are you sneaking up on me? I can karate you know!" She didn't. But lying was necessary in some cases. Like this one for an example.

The guy looked at his broken glasses. "I can see that."

Owen took a step forward with the book as her weapon.

"So-sorry. I just… I heard you sing and…"

"And you thought it would be fun to scare me to death?" she yelled.

The boy carefully started to pick up the books from the floor. Owen was still breathing heavily but finally she put the book down. She was embarrassed but she wasn't going to show it. She had just seen that guitar laying in the room and the school was practically empty, she didn't think anyone would hear her.

"I… I just wanted to listen… that's all…"

She felt a little guilty over his glasses but didn't say anything about it. She recognized him slightly, but the school was big and he didn't go to any of her classes.

"You are really good," he said as he placed the last one of her books on the table. "I heard that… You know before you started hitting me. You aren't in the choir… I'm in it and I heard your voice and thought that maybe…"

Said the guy who she had just been punching the hell out of. Owen scowled. Took up all the books in her arms and pushed her way past him out of the room.

"I don't have the time," she mumbled and rushed down the empty corridor.

----

Fox knocked politely on the hatch door.

No one opened.

He knocked a little harder.

No one opened.

He banged both of his fists on the door.

No one opened.

He tried to open it himself.

It worked.

Hoping that no one noticed the whole embarrassing knocking part he went into the hatch. He heard voices, and thankfully not in his head. It was Jack and he walked in a faster pace down the tunnel.

"Fox!"

He almost went right into John Locke. He stumbled and Locke took his arm and he steadied himself.

"Hey," he said awkwardly. Locke was blocking his path. "I was going to push the b-button?"

"That's not necessary." Locke smiled. It didn't give much comfort though.

"Is J-Jack here? Shouldn't he b-be at the beach?"

"Is anyone on fire?"

"Um… no?"

"Has Lori stabbed anyone?"

"I-I don't think so…"

"Is anyone in fatal danger?"

"Not re-really…"

Locke nodded slowly to himself. "Then there's no reason for Jack to be there right now?"

Fox was unsure, he tried to walk past Locke but Locke blocked him Fox frowned. This was very unlike Locke's usual behavior.

"Did you want something Fox?" he asked calmly and continued to block Fox's passageway.

"Yes. I wanted t-to push the button!"

Locke still had that smile on his face "I'm doing that now."

"I c-can may-maybe take your sh-shift?"

Locke shook his head slowly. Fox realized that apparently, for some reason no one else was allowed to be in the hatch. Locke followed him on his way out and stared after him to make sure he really left.

Something was going on.

--

Locke returned from his encounter with Fox and Jack couldn't help but glare angrily at him. He was still confused about this, things didn't make sense, nothing did. The fire, Shannon's death, Boone and Brian just leaving and now _this. _

"He says he was on the way to rescue us?"

"Yes." Bonnie repeated again. Jack saw she was getting restless as she strode back and forth across the room, still with the gun in her hand.

Locke arched an eyebrow. "He _says_. Whether he speaks the truth or not…"

"That's why we knocked him out… several times," Bonnie explained. "We couldn't be sure if he was telling the truth. So far all he's given us is fairytale stories of his life. No proof that he is from that freighter he talks about."

Jack still didn't say anything, he had a headache.

"So how do we find out the truth?"

Bonnie threw up her hands – Jack stared at the gun. "I don't know. We brought him to you guys so you could figure out the truth. But as it seems a lot has been going on since we left." She looked directly at Jack. "Like let's say, push the button or the world will end, the raft blowing up, Shannon dying, Brian kidnapping Boone, Kaylee becoming paralyzed –"

"Kaylee's not paralyzed."

"Right." Bonnie nodded. "She just refuses to move her legs out of trauma? That was your explanation right?" she snapped.

Jack looked away. "It doesn't matter."

Bonnie made a sound as to protest but Locke talked before she got the chance. "What should we do about the guns? Since our 'freighter man' is in the armory we need to put it someplace else."

Jack looked at Bonnie. Bonnie got the point.

"Not a part of the A-Team yet huh? What do I have to do? Seriously." She continued to mutter for herself as she left the kitchen.

Locke turned to Jack. "She took the gun with her."

Jack sighed. "Bonnie!"

"Fine, fine," she growled and rushed back. She handed the gun to Locke (not without sending him fierce glares) and with her head held high she left the room again.

"I think we should hide it."

"Hide it from whom?" Locke asked.

"The fire, at the beach, it could have been the others."

"But you think it was one of us?"

Jack shrugged. "It is possible. I think we should hide all the weapons in a place –"

"Only we know of?"

Jack felt like he was making a deal with the devil. "Yes."

From inside the armory the man started to bang the inside of the door. Shouting at them to let him speak, to let him go. Jack gazed at the door and felt the stress rise in his chest at thought of everything that was going on. But he had to prioritize.

"I'm going after Boone and Brian," he told Locke and tried to keep his voice steady.

Locke ran a finger along his jaw, thoughtful. "It's been a day Jack."

"It doesn't matter. I'm going after them. And I need someone who can follow tracks."

"I believe that Brian and Boone leaving was their own decision. I am not going to follow them."

Jack chuckled. "You're not the only tracker on this island, you know that right?"

--

The feeling of happiness thrilling through his every vein quickly evolved into plain fear. Allen was aware that she wasn't really there. Just a hallucination like always and it was stupid for him to hope – to wish still when he knew his daughter was _gone._

Then she screamed 'Daddy!"' and threw her arms around him.

He didn't remember much after that. He did cry, the dried tears on his cheeks told him that and Claret said he had been laughing like an idiot, she'd said that with a smile though.

Many of the survivors came up to them. Congratulated them. It sounded silly, congratulating a father and a daughter for reuniting; like it had been a difficult task and they'd done well. But Allen was too happy to care about that.

There were things that still troubled his mind. The man they found in the net, the fire and the death. But he put those aside as Ellie chatted away about the days she was with the other survivors, telling him about Andrea and giggling as memories of Eva came into her mind. But she would get sad too. She would wrinkle her forehead and just stop in the middle of a line and stare past him. Remembering something she didn't want to think about.

And then he'd seen Libby. It was very strange to say hello to your old psychiatrist on an island after a plane crash.

"She looks a lot like you." Claret smiled and cut the piece of meat. Locke had returned with boar the other night.

"No she doesn't." Allen still was smiling like a fool. He watched Ellie talk very fast and very loud with Dom who obviously looked uncomfortable. He held a mango in his hand and Allen suspected he was supposed to bring it to Kay. But Ellie just continued to rant.

"Yes she does, she got your eyes," Claret argued. Ellie finally stopped talking to Dom when Sawyer walked by and quickly started to ramble on to him instead.

"She looks a lot more like her mother," Allen admitted.

Ellie left Sawyer's side and skipped over by her father. "Son of a bitch!"

Allen dropped the meat on the sand. "What?"

Ellie's eyes were gleaming with joy. "Sawyer said it."

"I'll watch her." Claret said with a sigh as Allen left to kill Sawyer. He didn't get far. He froze in his tracks when he saw him sitting down with Rosalie at the outskirts of the camp.

--

"Jack – what's going on?"

Jack thought he would be used to Lori just knowing stuff. But as usual her eyes didn't look at him, never did. Jack continued to walk in a hurried pace towards the camp.

"Hey – Jackie, slow down!" Lori ran up by his side.

"I'm going after Boone and Brian."

"Isn't it a bit late for that?"

Jack glared at her.

"You're glaring at me. I'm not blind – well I am blind but I know you're glaring at me!"

"Boone was really hurt."

"Just like Brian."

Jack shook his head. "Your point Lorraine?"

"My point is that Brian healed, okay, he was knocking on heaven's door and maybe he knows how to fix his friend. And don't call me Lorraine! I will kill you. When you're awake so you'll feel the pain."

Jack laughed to himself even though he was frustrated. "I'm going after them."

"And I'm going with you. Just which direction are we supposed to take? Or are we just going to wander aimlessly through the jungle with ninja assassins?"

"Ninja assassins?" Kim was working on building her shelter. From what Jack saw it was not working very well as one of the poles supposed to hold it up broke in the middle just as she took a step towards them. Kim grimaced but didn't turn around.

"Yes. The others."

Kim frowned. "I always thought they were cannibals."

"I like you," Lori said and smiled, "do you want to come along on a suicide mission with no point?"

--

"Coconut?"

Rosalie stared at the sea. She sat on a flat rock in the sand and she didn't acknowledge Sawyer's presence at all.

Sawyer sighed. "_Rosalie._ You got to eat."

Rosalie still gazed out at the waves and her hair blew in her face. Sawyer reached out a hand to stroke it back but hesitated. Rosalie rose slowly up on her feet, and without a word she began to walk back towards the camp.

--

"I-I can't hold him."

Owen looked almost with pity at Claire. She wasn't holding Aaron, Fox was at her side was and he looked extremely uncomfortable with the baby in his arms.

Claire shook her head and there were tears in her eyes. "It just hurts… my hands… what if I drop him?"

"Okay, Claire, let's put it like this – Fox is a very clumsy and nervous person. He _will_ drop Aaron. And unless you want the kid to come out like Zidler either you take him or he does."

Claire took a deep breath and reached out her hands. Fox awkwardly handed Aaron over to her. She winced slightly at the contact of her sore hands but then she smiled down at her son.

"Miracle of the day - check. Come on Fox let's cure Kaylee!"

Owen left her shelter (that she now was sharing with Claire) but Fox didn't come after her. She turned around.

"Edwards?"

"I-" He was looking at the group that was starting to form by the jungle, "I-"

"I what?" Owen shouted as he just ran towards them.

----

"Hey Dad."

Her father put on the light and his eyes met hers. She was sitting in the sofa in the hall and the whole house had been dark before he came home.

"I swear Owen, you must be a bat." He kissed her forehead and put down his case. "I know no one who likes the dark like you do."

He didn't mention that there was no music on, that the whole house was quiet, that Owen was quiet.

"I was at the hospital," she suddenly said, "I dropped off a couple of books."

Owen followed him into the kitchen and leaned against the wall as he began to take things out of the fridge. He didn't acknowledge that's he had spoken.

"I heard good literature can cure the worst diseases."

Her father's hand stopped in mid-air. With a sigh he closed the fridge and glanced at her. "So how was school?"

"Did you visit Mom at the hospital?" she said just as quickly. "She said you didn't."

Her father still didn't acknowledge it. "At work it went great, you know the coffee machine –"

Owen grabbed the plate and threw it on the floor. Her father stared at the broken pieces, his mouth wide open.

"When are we going to talk about the fact that Mom's dying?" Owen shouted.

Her father avoided looking at her. His eyes went to the window, it was black outside. The lamppost was broken.

"You have to clean that up," he said and left the room.

----

"Sean says he might be able to pick up a trail."

"_Might,_" Sean reminded him, "it hasn't rained and since Boone was pretty hurt I think he at least left some heavy trails."

"Awesome," said Lori and took one of the guns. She was almost knocked over by Fox who seemed to have no coordination of his feet. Jack frowned. He hadn't seemed so clumsy a week ago. Just nervous.

"W-where are you g-guys going?" He stammered and his gaze fell on Kim.

"We're going to find Boone and Brian, maybe some trails and…" He couldn't say he hoped to find some clue of where Flor and Walt were, but he did hope they would.

Fox's eyes widened. "C-can I come too?"

Kim's smile shone. "Sure!"

Jack was a bit put off by the fact that Fox wasn't asking him. Fox stretched out a hand towards Jack. Jack looked down at it.

"Um…"

"G-gun?"

"Oh, right." He handed one over to him and he grabbed it was strangely ease. Kim had refused to take one, but instead she held a long knife and she waved with it as they left the camp.

--

Kaylee was sitting by her tent. She looked out at the camp and her eyes fell on Claire, she was walking by the water with Aaron in her arms, from the way her lips moved she was singing to him, smiling. Claire was fine, why wasn't she just as okay?

Maybe it was a punishment. The thought crossed her mind before she could stop it. It was a punishment, for her murders, for all she'd done. But then, why had Claire also been in the fire? Claire had done nothing bad.

Claire saw Kaylee looking at her and smiled even brighter. She walked up the beach and her feet were full with sand. "Hey Kay."

Kaylee was grateful that Claire looked her in the eye. "How's the baby?"

"He's fine." Claire gazed dotingly at her son. "Oh, wanted to talk to you about something."

Kaylee gestured for Claire to sit down and she did. "What about?"

"I heard Jack said that the reason you're not able to use your legs is because of some sort of emotional trauma?"

Kay nodded and remembered Dom punching Jack on the jaw. "Yes he did."

"You know we got our own island shrink," Claire said carefully.

"Who do you mean?"

"Libby, I think maybe we could talk to her. You about your leg and I about…" Claire sighed and gazed down at her son again, "the time I spent with the others."

Claire looked at her like she expected her to get mad.

"Okay," Kay said and surprised her. "We can talk to her."

--

"Hey!" Bonnie smiled and stepped into the computer room. Locke pressed execute and the timer reset again.

"Hello Bonnie, back so soon?"

Bonnie stared up at the timer. "Jack left the camp to go on a mission. Sawyer's busy attending to Rosalie and Allen's occupied being cute with his daughter so I thought I'd come over here and help you… with our um, 'freighter' problem." She turned around to him again. "Have you interrogated him?"

Locke shook his head. "I had to deal with the armory first."

"So…"

Locke raised an eyebrow in question.

Bonnie waved her hands. "The interrogation?"

In the jungle the man in the net had looked eerily calm before they approached him, and then he had started to yell and shake the net and begged to be released all the sudden. They had acted fast, Allen cut down the rope and the man fell and hurt his shoulder pretty badly but he had been thankful. Repeating that he had been on some kind of freighter, asked if they were survivors and before he knew it Bonnie had knocked him out with her gun.

It was something about the eyes. How cold and insensitive they were. She didn't trust him. She just got the feeling that he was lying.

But now, as they opened the door to the armory and the man looked up from the small bed inside. She felt a pang of guilt in her chest, even though she still felt suspicion. His shoulder was blue with bruises and he had dried blood in his hair from all the times she silenced him. He was probably over forty.

Bonnie was an actress, and she got the feeling this man knew how to act too.

"I guess you aren't here to let me go?"

"No," Locke said, "we aren't."

The man sighed and looked down at the floor. "I don't know why you are treating me like this. I have done nothing against you… I just…" He looked up and those blue eyes stared directly into Bonnie's, "was here to see if you – if you were alive."

"Is that so?" Locke asked in his calm voice.

"Yes!"

"Let's cut to the basics," Bonnie said quickly. "Name?"

She noticed a slight hesitation. "Frederic Phelps."

Bonnie glanced at Locke. She recognized the name… where had she heard it?

"You said you were on a freighter." Bonnie was trying to remember where she had heard that name before.

"Yes… I was on a freighter on its way to this island. A mission to try to find and save the survivors from flight 815!"

"Why?" Bonnie asked before Locke had a chance to say anything.

The man looked taken aback. "What?"

"It's one word and one question, why?"

The man still didn't understand.

"If you were on a freighter on its way to the island. Then why were you stuck in a net? Why aren't the rest here? Why aren't we all rescued by now?"

"Because… we weren't sure you were alive. We didn't even know where the island was! It was a lucky shot –"

"How did you get here?" Locke asked before Bonnie got the chance.

"Helicopter, it dropped me off. There was some malfunction and I crashed down… I had a parachute though that saved me and I wandered around trying to find my equipment and packing with a radio so I could contact my people but – I got caught in a net."

Bonnie blinked and frowned in thought, she was unsure, the man sounded like he was telling the truth. Somehow he was less threatening now locked in, than out in the open and she felt like maybe, she believed him. She knew that there was something coming to the island, she remembered that time when Sawyer had led them to the station – the computer.

"Hello party people – oh lord of The Beatles!"

Bonnie closed her eyes and hoped that the person standing behind them would disappear. The person didn't.

"Hey Owen," Locke greeted her.

----

"I think I saw an Elvis lookalike walk down the corridor."

Owen stopped touching her mother's bald head and let her hand fall to her side. "Yeah… you told me that yesterday."

"I did? Oh…"

"Hey," Owen took her hand and smiled. "I got a B in math."

"That's great honey." Her mother's smile was weak, bit it made Owen feel a whole lot better. Despite the clinical smell, the white hospital robe around her mother and the monitors that beeped - her mother's smile made it not be that bad.

"I brought you…" Owen reached into her bag, "this!"

Her mother let out a little laugh. "Another book?"

"No, actually it's a comic book. It got all these pictures in it, great for when you're high… I mean…"

Her mother raised an eyebrow.

"So I've heard. From the… um…"

Her mother closed her eyes. It was sudden but Owen was used to it. She got tired all the time, from the smallest of things, picking up a book… talking… watching the TV.

"Bye Mom," she leaned in to kiss her mother on the cheek. But then her eyes opened.

"No… can you stay a little while longer?"

"You're tired."

"Yes… I am… But I can't sleep. Can you sing me to sleep?"

Owen looked around, on the mute TV she suddenly saw flashing lights, a black girl wrapped in a red dress, from the way the crowd was cheering and the microphone in her hand she was singing.

"Of course."

----

"Wait – so you captured this… guy who's supposed to rescue us?"

Either Owen could run to the beach and tell everyone about the man in the hatch, or Locke and Bonnie could share all they knew with her – and they chose the latter. None of them felt the need to upset and worry everyone right now, not with everything going on.

"Yes," Locke answered and looked slightly bored with the whole situation. Huh, Bonnie, Allen and Sawyer had been forced to listen to he and Jack rant when they explained it.

"Why?" Owen asked. "I mean, he's here to help us and you go and imprison him!"

"Or, maybe he's not."

Owen hesitated. "What do you mean?"

"We think he might be one of the others."

Owen blinked and then she laughed nervously. "Are you serious? You – you think he's an other? Guys, the others kidnapped me and Claire and infiltrated us and they held us captured – and you think one of them just went and got caught in a net just like that?"

"Or," Bonnie repeated, "he's here to infiltrate us."

Owen frowned. "That makes a little more sense to me. But really, how are we going to find out the truth?"

"The parachute," Locke said after a moment of silence, "all his equipment – if we find it, it means he's probably telling the truth."

Owen smiled. "Probably telling the truth sounds better!"

----

"I… I talked to the school shrink."

Owen turned off the radio. Stared at her father and slowly raised from her bed.

"YOU DID WHAT?"

"I knew you would get mad…" her father said desperately. "But… I didn't know what to do about your mother… I was blaming myself Owen. And I was selfish, I thought it would all go away if we didn't talk about. That it all would be some kind of dream. I'm sorry. I'm ready to talk about it now –"

"Did you talk to Mom?" she snapped.

Her father exhaled deeply. "No… but…"

"Talk to her first and then we can talk."

Her father nodded slowly. "Okay. I'm going now."

The phone rang and her father stopped in the entrance to her room.

"Hello?" Owen answered the phone. "Yes this is her…"

She put down the phone almost immediately, her eyes wide and her hands shivering. She ignored it when it started to ring again. Slowly she turned to her father.

"They said she fell asleep…" Owen whispered. "They said Mom fell asleep and that she never woke up."

----

"Kaylee – Kay were you crying?"

Kate pulled the blanket off Kay's face and behind it tears streamed. She felt hopeless as she got a lump in the throat and watched her friend cry to herself in the dark of the tent.

"No," Kay answered weakly through the tears. She sat up and Kate seated herself next to her. Kaylee leaned on her shoulder and the tears continued to spill and soon Kate was sobbing too.

Kay tried to dry her tears away and she sniffed. "Who do you think made the fire Kate?"

Kate looked at Kay's big, sad eyes and tried her hardest to keep her voice steady.

"I don't know honey, I don't know."

"And then," someone chirped from outside the tent, "Megan told me that Santa didn't exist! But I know she was lying because –"

Dom put his head inside the tent and mouthed _'save me'_. Kay giggled but Kate saw out of the corner of her eye how another tear fell.

A voice came from behind him, but it wasn't the little girl. "Dom, is Kay there? Can I talk to her?" It was Claire.

Kate couldn't be around it any longer. She ruffled Dom's hair (he was so sensitive about that) and smiled at Ellie who waved. She glanced at Claire who stepped into the tent to talk with Kaylee about something and she walked over to the place Claire's shelter had been. Zidler and Margo were currently carrying away the burned pieces and cleaning up the mess, Kate wondered why both of them had black soot smudged on their faces and suspected there had been some sort of dust war earlier.

"You guys need some help?" she asked when she came up to them.

"Yes please!" Zidler grinned.

"Everyone else abandoned us," Margo said cheerfully, "Andrea too just because I _accidentally_ ruined her clothes."

Kate looked down at her simple brown shirt and blue jeans shorts. She liked those shorts. Still, she decided to help them. It kept her mind off Kaylee, well, most of the time when Zidler and Margo were chatting away happily. But when they went silent her mind just went back to Kaylee. Kaylee with flames around her. Kaylee with red skin and no breath. Kaylee who couldn't move her legs anymore. Trauma. Jack said it was trauma and she hoped it was.

"I mean," Margo rambled about something Kate hadn't been paying attention to, "the closed hatch door must be mad at me. I can never open it and I have to knock and knock and…"

Kate glanced sideways at Rosalie staring at the jungle, just standing in front of it with dead eyes. Her wife who had apparently gone to get some water hurried over the sand to her side.

Kate wanted to ask Rosalie questions, because she had been in the same position as Kaylee, but she couldn't bring herself to do it, not now and not in a long time.

--

Kay managed to get Dom to leave and then Claire brought Libby back to her tent. Libby sat down in front of them.

"What do you want help with?" she asked gently.

Claire looked at Kaylee. "You first," she whispered.

Kaylee avoided looking at them. "I… uh, Jack thinks the reason I can't move my legs is because of trauma and um… I wondered if there was some way to… if its' true or…"

"Sometimes," Libby said in her same calm voice, "bad things happen, you do bad things or bad things happen to you or both. It can lead to depression or trauma from events that hurt us badly. It's possible that you just think you can't move your legs but you can."

Kaylee didn't get it. She glanced at Claire who seemed to take in every word Libby was saying.

Libby continued, "Do you feel like you deserve it?"

Kay turned to her quickly. "What?" she croaked.

"Have you had thoughts, like it's a punishment and that you shouldn't be able to walk?"

"I…"

"Maybe you do know that you can walk, but you just won't do it."

"All right that's enough!" Kay yelled. "That's just crap, if I wanted to walk then I should be able to walk right… you're just confusing…"

"Your leg just flinched."

"What?" Kay's eyes got wide.

"Yes it did!" Claire stared at her legs like they were the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen. "It just did!"

Kay pointed a finger at Libby. "Don't say I told you so!"

--

"You think it's safe to leave the camp after you just had a fire?" Kim asked Jack and pulled away a branch. They both stepped over the small rocks on the ground.

"I didn't leave it unguarded." Jack thought of Bonnie and Lalita. Even though Jack barely knew Lalita, he knew she was Rosalie's wife and she sent off some kind of warning signal as soon as you came close to her, one that said _'hurt my family and you die'_. Jack was glad to have her on their side.

Kim fell back and began to walk side by side with Fox. Jack saw Lori smile as Fox began to stammer more and more while getting redder and redder in the face.

In front of them Sean was walking with a very serious expression, inspecting the jungle around them. Jack had no idea how he did it, for him it all seemed like rocks and trees and more and more green, no pattern or anything to tell where someone had been walking.

Suddenly the sky opened up and the rain poured down on them. Kim yelled in surprise and immediately Fox gave her his backpack to protect herself from the rain. The action seemed to surprise even him.

"Look – smiley face plus shelter – equals awesome!" Lori shouted and rushed further into the jungle. They all followed her quickly and soon Jack found that the rain wasn't dropping down on them anymore.

"That's so…" Kim looked up at the air balloon and was at loss for words.

Jack was looking down at the grave.

--

Owen convinced Locke and Bonnie to follow the man's direction to where he had landed. The man even wrote down a map for them with a smug smile in his face, and then Locke told Owen how important it was that she pressed the button and didn't tell anyone about him.

Owen promised and watched after them as she left. Then she ran to the door to the armory, opened the lock with the code and pulled the door opened. She stood there and stared at the man across the armory, leaning against the wall.

She didn't say anything, just held her head high and with her eyes dared him to speak.

"Hello," he said after a while. Owen rolled her eyes.

"What the _hell_ are you doing here?"

The man blinked and for one second Owen saw confusion in his face but it was quick.

"I am here to rescue you."

"That's crap and you know it. I know who you are _Ben."_

"I knew you would remember," he said slowly.

"Well," Owen took a step forward, "you looked pretty surprised to me." She smirked. "Didn't expect me to remember a thing did you?"

The man stood silent and she arched an eyebrow.

"I did not," he admitted. "I thought that if you would remember you would tell your friends about me. I'm a little confused about that now, why didn't you tell them the truth?"

"That you are an other and definitely not Frederic Phelps?" Owen shrugged. "Honestly I'm not really interested in telling that to you. Since, you kidnapped me and all, ah the good times. Switched positions now right?"

He didn't show any fear or confusion, but she knew it was there underneath his mask.

"What should I do first? Drug you, take one of your friends and torture him or her, oh! Maybe I should just dig up information about your family and blackmail you! Like you did remember?"

The man looked down but it wasn't a sign of weakness, almost – like he was laughing at her and didn't want to show it.

Owen fought the urge to stomp her foot in the ground. "I don't get why you want to be captured, I'm not going to ask why, just one thing…"

"Yes?"

"Am I supposed to let you go?"

They stared at each other.

"No," he answered, "you aren't."

"Owen?" Owen swung around. She heard Locke's steps in the tunnel and with one last look at their prisoner she closed the door and the lock. She ran towards the sound of Locke's voice and he looked stressed.

"We forgot the map."

Owen stared at him. The map… oh right that map. Hadn't they taken it?

"It's on the table," she told him quickly. He looked worriedly at her before he left the tunnel. Owen looked after him.

Suddenly a beeping sound started. Owen turned around and looked around, it didn't sound like the usual alarm.

"_Please… proceed… protocol…"_

"Locke!" Owen shouted, she saw a speaker and hurried to it, the voice came from there.

"What's that noise?" she heard their prisoner shout from his cell.

"_Ten seconds to lockdown… nine… eight… seven…"_

"Locke!" Owen called again and tapped the speaker with her hand, not that it did much good.

"… _six… five… four… three… two… one…"_

With horror Owen heard a screeching sound. She swung around and ran through the kitchen and into the same room Locke was in. The blast door was going down but Locke grabbed a crow bar and slipped it under the door.

"What happened?" their prisoner shouted.

----

His name was Sven, and he was the most annoying person in the world.

Owen let him sit with her at lunch because she broke his glasses, but following her around every single step was taking was too far and introducing her as his friend to people – the madness had to stop.

"Leave me alone!" she spat at him when he was waiting at her locker.

Instead of getting hurt or snapping back. He looked at her pitying.

Owen should never have told her teacher about the death of her mother. He promised not to tell anyone. Of course he did. Only good thing was that she suddenly got better grades. But now, every time she got mad or threw a punch at someone's face they all thought it was because of her mourning.

He stayed as she took out her books, still with that irritating look in his eyes.

"You know. I can kill you and not get a punishment," Owen said. "They will blame it on issues and give me an A in gym."

"Join the choir."

"No."

"Please."

"I will strangle you and smile as you die."

"You are talented."

"You are an expert in being an idiot."

"You have the time now."

She met his gaze and looked away. "Nice, real nice. So now when my mother's dead I'm suddenly allowed to have fun?"

He started to stammer excuses, she just walked away, the good thing was that he at least stopped stalking her – for that day.

----

"One word: Poker."

And that was how Hurley found himself seated underneath Wendy's shelter playing that stupid game together with Claret, Wendy, Allen and a five year old.

"Four actually," Ellie said and smiled angelic at him. Hurley had no idea how she knew what he was thinking. Outside the rain was falling heavy and they all had to almost shout to be heard.

"I bet four papayas," Claret declared and smiled.

"You have no poker face at all," Wendy said who had held the same expression through the entire game. Stone hard cold. No matter how ridiculous cute Ellie was and funny he himself was.

"You can't bet," Wendy said in a matter of fact tone. "I just bet. Either you raise or lay them down."

"Um…" Ellie said and looked around at the adults, "Are we supposed to stand up or lay down? I don't understand."

"That's enough playing," Allen said determined but warm, "come on princess."

"She's such an angel. She doesn't even argue," Claret said after they left them.

"Angel?"

Hurley looked up and saw Sawyer stand there with a water bottle; he was soaked wet from the rain. "Sorry to ruin the illusion Mary Poppins but that little thing is so damn traumatized she can't even see straight anymore."

"Oh really dude?" Hurley said and tried to get the mood up. Sawyer looked so serious and Claret was suddenly broody, "at least she's better than you at poker."

"Better than you Muttonchops." Sawyer smirked. "But unfortunately I ain't got the time to beat that straight out of your hands."

"What do you have better to do?" Claret asked.

"Me and you at the hatch, candlelit dinner – what do you say?" Sawyer didn't wait for an answer, just smirked again and without a single hesitation of the pouring rain he went into the jungle.

"Dudes, just so you know," Hurley said after Sawyer left, "I don't have a straight, just so you know!"

--

"Hey what's going on?" the man called but they both ignored him. Locke tried to get the door to budge but it didn't even move.

"Let me help," Owen said between their prisoner's shouts and together they managed to budge it barely.

"What were those noises? What's wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong!" Owen shouted angrily, but to Locke she whispered: "What the hell just happened?"

Locke just shook his head and stared at the door. "I-I have no idea."

Owen took a deep breath. "I got to check something…" She rushed out from the room and Locke continued to inspect the blast door. He trailed his hand across it and didn't understand why it had come down.

Owen returned, panting. "We – we can't leave."

"What?" Locke turned to her.

She looked at him wide-eyed. "There's a blast door covering the way out too. No one can come in…"

"Don't worry. Bonnie's out there waiting, she'll know that something's wrong and go get help."

Owen nodded but still looked afraid. "Don't worry?" she then snapped and her fear became anger. "This whole place is at lockdown! _Lockdown! _And you expect me not to worry? This is just crazy…"

Locke let her feel sorry for herself for one whole minute, then he opened his mouth again.

"We have to get the blast door up," he told her. "We have to push the button."

"Who knows if the world will really end if it goes below zero?" she whined but she still helped him try to get the door up again.

"Hurry!" Locke shouted and sweated with the effort to hold the door up. Owen slid a toolbox underneath it and they both exhaled in relief as it stuck there.

"Good," Owen said. They looked at each other for a moment.

"I'm not going down there!" Owen exclaimed. "What if it comes down and crushes my leg?"

Locke laughed to himself bent down and began to slid under the door with his legs first.

"STOP!" Owen yelled but the blast door creaked and the toolbox got crushed. It slammed into Locke's leg and he screamed in pain. His leg stuck underneath the blast door. He wrenched in agony and Owen quickly took the first things she found – which were records and threw them away. She got several weights from the barbell set instead.

"Put them there," Locke managed to say and he groaned in pain again. Owen put them to relieve some of the pressure from Locke's leg.

"What happened?" their prisoner asked.

"SHUT UP!" both Locke and Owen yelled.

----

They were singing songs.

Songs about God, Jesus and Christianity.

Boy, when he said choir she had not expected this. Not that she had much of a problem with song with those themes – but singing them with low uneven voices while smiling? How could that Sven guy think she was supposed to fit into the group? She liked The Beatles, Pink Floyd not songs about fuzzy feelings of love to the opposite sex.

Yes, they sang that.

Owen turned around and walked right out of the auditorium. Her steps echoed across the walls and she didn't know why she felt such disappointment. She hadn't even wanted to join; she just wanted to see how it was.

Her mother used to say she had a beautiful voice, but her mother was partial, all mothers were. But Sven said that she was talented too, but he had also stalked her when she walked home and hid behind bushes.

And her father… her father was talented in music. He taught music. But somehow she'd never let him hear her sing.

"I'm supposed to sweep there."

Owen blinked and stood up and moved away from the wall so the cleaner could sweep. He was staring at her, more precisely staring at her eyes.

"Yes, one is blue and the other one is green. And yes, I am David Bowie's long lost daughter!" she yelled. Brushed the dust of her jeans and ran down the hall.

----

The rain dripped from Bonnie's clothes and hair and her cries were probably not heard but she continued to hit the blast door. She had to get inside. Locke told her he was just going to get the map and then that freaking thing had come down in front of her before she could do anything. She had gone outside and back and she didn't know what to do. But she knew walking in circles didn't do much good.

"Locke? Owen!" she screamed.

"That ain't doing much good is it?"

Bonnie swung around and saw a soaking wet Sawyer stand behind her. She restrained herself from throwing her arms around him.

"What are you screaming and banging for?"

"Locke," Bonnie breathed, "and Owen, they're inside and this thing just came down and I don't know why. I think they're locked in."

Sawyer looked like he didn't believe her and he touched the blast door with his hand, realization passed his face. "What the hell…"

"We have to open it. I thought about going back to the beach to get some help but –"

"Hang on a second there Missy. They could be in real trouble in there. Remember we got our very own Jean –"

Bonnie's eyes widened. "The Phelps guy."

"Yeah."

"You think maybe he –"

"That's exactly what I'm thinking. We need weapons but Doc and Mr. Clean are the only ones who know where they are…"

Bonnie bit her lip and looked at the falling rain that seemed to have calmed down. "Actually, I kind of overheard them."

There was a gleam in Sawyer's eye. "Where are the guns Blondie?"

--

The rain finally stopped and so did Sean's long whining over the fact that all the tracks would be gone. The sky was darker and the night was closing in quickly. Jack sat underneath the big tree next to Lori and waited for Sean to admit that he couldn't find the tracks again.

Two people who weren't tired of the long endless waiting as the rain fell were Kim and Fox. At least not Kim who seemed to enjoy talking about random things to Fox who barely said a word. Not that he seemed offended by it, he was actually grinning.

"BRIAN! BOONE!"

Jack almost fell to his side and Kim yelled in shock. "Why'd you do that?" she screamed at Lorraine.

Lori shrugged. "No one had tried that yet. Had to see if it worked."

Kim looked at Lorraine like she was crazy, even though she had just been telling Fox about why pants were far better than trousers – when Jack knew there was no difference between those at all.

"It's over." Sean came back and almost fell over the grave – he wasn't usually clumsy but now he looked so hopeless. Jack wondered why it meant so much to Sean that they succeeded in this mission.

"Don't be such a drama queen," Lori told him. "It's not over. Kim here will run back to the beach and get Eko and he'll track for us.

Now Jack was staring at Lori like she was crazy.

"I th-think we should g-go back," Fox said quietly.

Jack stood up and Lori did the same. "We're not going back – Sean, are you sure you lost the trail?"

"Yes I'm sure… maybe we could go back further into the jungle but… there wasn't really a real trail to begin with!"

"I agree with Fox," Lori said. "We should go back."

"If we go back we will have no chance of finding them!"

"It's really dark now," Kim stated the obvious, "I think we should make camp and light a fire."

"Just be careful you don't burn down the whole jungle."

Kim gasped and gripped Fox's shoulder tightly. Jack swung around and saw a tall woman come out from the jungle. Her hair was long and brown and her eyes a stunning blue color. She wore something that looked like rugs and she had no shoes on her feet.

A light smile rested on her lips. "You should point the gun down Sean."

"Who are you?" Jack asked the woman.

Sean still held the weapon high. A shot rang out and he stumbled, for one moment Jack thought he had been shot but the bullet had just blown past his ear.

"Let's all just calm down," she said gently. "Put down your weapons."

"Where are the kids?" Kim suddenly cried out and was followed by Sean and Lori asking about Flor and Walt.

"Don't worry about them," the woman answered. "They are fine."

"We're supposed to take your word for that?" Sean spat at her.

She turned her eyes to him. "Yes you are."

Jack glared at her. "What do you want?"

"Do as Kimika said, build a fire and we'll talk."

--

The alarm went off and the sound was unbearable.

"You – you got to push the button."

Owen shook her head. "It's impossible. There's no way to get there…" Her eyes glazed over and then she left his side.

"Where are you going?" Locke shouted after her and groaned in pain again.

When Owen came back, she didn't come back alone.

"Oh…" the prisoner stared at the blast door.

"Come on," Owen said quite rudely and together they tried to get the blast door up by heaving more weights underneath it.

"It's not going to work," the man informed them. "Is there another way to get into that room that you are so fond of?"

Locke wondered what Owen had told him to make him cooperate. Maybe he really was here to get them off the island – if that was the case he had a lot of planning to do.

"The vents." Locke grimaced. "Through the vents… the grate and then you can climb…"

"Okay, okay," Owen calmed him. She turned to the man at her side.

"Just got to get you back to your prison first."

"There's not enough time –" Locke protested but they were already gone.

--

"Just calm down everyone, Jack – sit down," the woman said in the same freakishly calm voice. Sean stared at her, he still held his gun but he hadn't fired it.

Lori shook her head. "How do you know our names?"

The woman just smiled.

"Where's Flor?" Sean snapped at her. "Where is she? Have you hurt her?"

The woman sighed. "Florence is fine."

"Where is she? You tell me where she is or I'm going to shoot you."

"You are not going to shoot me."

Sean's fingers shivered in want to fire a bullet at her but he held himself back. He couldn't kill her. He had to get answers. "You said you wanted to talk."

"I said that yes. How long have you been on this island? Not that long have you?"

Sean stared at her and wondered what her point was, she continued to speak:

"When you go over a man's house for the first time, do you take off your shoes? Do you put your feet up on his table? Do you eat food that doesn't belong to you? Open doors to rooms you know he wanted locked?" She looked directly at Jack at every word she said. "Someone very clever once said: 'Since the dawn of our species man's been blessed with curiosity.' This is not your island. This is _our_ island. And the only reason you are living on it is because we let you live on it."

Jack smiled and the woman for the first time seemed a bit put off by it. "I don't believe you."

"What don't you believe Jack?"

"I think you've got one guy up there with a gun. I think there are more of us than there are of you. I think if you had any real strength, you wouldn't have had to send a spy – Ethan"

"Oh we didn't send _a_ spy Jack. And that other theory." She smiled back and held her arms up in the air.

Sean rotated and saw torch after torch getting lit. He swallowed and turned his gaze to the woman.

"Since you crashed here on this island there's been a misunderstanding, Sean, Kim, Jack and Lori, you're all here looking for two of your friends –listen to me now. Imagine a line, a line right here underneath this balloon. If you cross this, we will go from misunderstanding to something else. Please, just put down your weapons and go back. If you do that, we will consider returning them to you."

"No," Jack answered her harshly.

"Jack…" it was Kim, "maybe we should –"

"No!"

The woman looked with disappointment at Jack. "Bring him out Alex!"

Sean gawked at the bound and gagged man. Juliet put her hand on his shoulder and a gun to his head. Brian was bruised; hurt and he looked pleading at them. They just stared.

"Brian here wanted to save his friend, but he couldn't even save himself could he?" She looked pitying at him. "So, either you put down your weapons – walk away or I will shoot him."

Kim and Fox didn't even hesitate; they dropped their knife and gun immediately. Sean looked at Jack for some kind of order.

"Where is Walt?" he asked abruptly.

"Jack –" Lori begged.

The woman's cold eyes glanced at the blind girl before she turned to Jack again. "I'm going to make this easy. I'll count down from ten… nine… eight…"

Lori dropped her gun and Sean did the same but Jack still held the weapon in his hand.

"… seven… six… five… four…"

With a sigh Jack put down his gun on the ground. The woman stopped counting. She pushed Brian at them and he stumbled and fell at Lori's feet. The woman disappeared and the fires around them blackened. There was no sound from the many people that had been surrounding them, like they all vanished into thin air.

Then, Jack realized that the woman had addressed every one of them but Fox.

--

Owen jumped down on the floor of the computer room from the vent. She fell on her hand and twisted around on her back. She grimaced in pain and held her wrist and fought back the tears of pain.

With a groan she pulled herself up in a sitting position. The alarm still rang and the timer counted down. She stumbled over to the computer and with a shivering finger typed the number four.

Suddenly the computer gave a beeping sound and the number four was gone.

**1. A**

**2. B**

**3. D A**

Owen just stared at the screen and the options. The clock was ticking and the pain in her hand faded away as she had to think of what to do. What the hell was going on?

She hesitated. She pressed one.

And then everything went blue.

Owen looked bewildered around at the eerily blue color that radiated through the room. Her eyes landed on the blast door beneath the timer.

A map had appeared, drawn on the wall. Lines and red marks what all her mind could process over the piercing alarm. She gasped and remembered what she was there to do. The options were still there, irritated she pressed one again and the blue light disappeared, and so did the map.

She typed in the numbers and pressed execute. Finally it stopped and went back to 108. The blast door moved up and Owen leaned back in the chair, panting.

"What – everything turned blue – Owen what happened?"

Owen glanced at the man lying on the floor.

"Curiosity happened."

----

Years later she sang to her father for the first time.

Owen looked around at the crowd in the restaurant, some of them were watching her but most were busy eating and talking to each other. She knew her father was sitting on the left side of the room but she didn't glance at him. She pulled her now fierce red hair back and took a deep breath.

And she sang.

It wasn't a song she liked that much, it wasn't her style. But she knew that she was good, one after one the people stopped talking and looked at her. Saw her and heard her. And at the end, they applauded.

She still didn't look at her father; she just smiled and said thanks. Then when she stepped down from the stage she let herself look at him.

For the first time since her mother's death, he was smiling.

----

Bonnie and Sawyer both held one rifle each and hurried through the dark jungle. Sawyer had a flashlight but they both found themselves stumbling into trees or over rocks every other second.

"I hope they're okay," Bonnie mumbled. Sawyer didn't bother answering her. He was probably thinking about Rosalie.

"I can't see a damn thing!" Just as Sawyer uttered those words Bonnie grabbed his arm.

"Look!" she said and pointed through the trees.

"What the…"

A light flickered in the dark and they both carefully moved towards it.

"That's a parachute… it's a beacon that's making the light…" Bonnie studied the cargo.

"Look at this!" Sawyer smiled and held up a box. "It's food."

--

Owen had helped Locke up in the couch and she'd brought the medical kit.

"Are you sure you know what to do?" he asked when she took up a syringe.

"Yes, I know this stuff. I was a Girl Scout."

Locke didn't look that comforted by her words, so she began to tell him what happened in the computer room.

"…Then I couldn't press in the numbers! And there popped up three options, A, B and D A," she told him. "It was really weird. I pressed one, since I'm number one so I figured what bad could it do and then everything became blue."

"Yeah I saw that." Locke had his face in a grimace and Owen thought it would be kind of fun if it stayed that way.

"And then this drawing thing came up on the door, really strange and then I pushed the numbers in and the world didn't go under, all thanks to me."

"Locke!"

Owen looked up and saw Sawyer and Bonnie rush in. Both looked like drained cats and carried one gun each. Their eyes went immediately to the blood on the floor.

"What happened?"

"You can tell them," Owen patted Locke on the shoulder, stood up and went to get some cookies from the storage room.

--

Fox and Kim quickly went to set up her shelter for the night. Lori mumbled goodbye to him and Sean just walked away without a word. Jack was left with Brian.

The man wasn't so bad they thought he was. Brian was mostly just confused and hungry. Jack looked over his wounds and tried to ease the pain as much as he could. Andrea, who was awake came pretty quickly and helped him without asking questions. He was thankful for that.

Jack gave Brian a shirt and let him have some rest, their conversation could wait, he wasn't happy about that but sometimes he had to just… wait.

Jack walked Andrea back to her shelter; it was mostly four sticks in the ground and a big piece of garment.

"Andrea," he said quietly, "how did you defend yourselves?"

Andrea looked curiously at him. "What do you mean?"

"You, the other survivors, how did you fight against the others?"

"By taking them by surprise and sheer luck. That's how Ana killed Goodwin."

Jack nodded to himself. "Tell me Andy, how long do you think it would take to train an army?"

--

**Author's Notes:** You can't see it, but I just made a very big invisible sign in the sky with the words 'THANK YOU' on it, I love your reviews and now I got 160! So I updated! Feel the logic.

And, I hope it is okay I changed Owen's past a little.

Thank you again for your reviews.

Namaste.


	22. For the Tears

Whose forms we can't discover  
For the tears that drip all over!  
Huge moons there wax and wane—  
Again—again—again—  
Every moment of the night—  
Forever changing places—

_And they put out the star-light  
With the breath from their pale faces.  
About twelve by the moon-dial,  
One more filmy than the rest  
(A kind which, upon trial,  
They have found to be the best)_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 20, For the Tears**

--

"Hey."

Brian looked up and saw the Latina chick stand in the entrance of his shelter. Behind her he saw some of the survivors stared with curiosity and look away as they noticed he saw them.

"Hey," he answered Ana-Lucia and went back to the book he wasn't reading. Just looking at the words and pretending that he was.

She stepped in and sat down in the seat. "How did it go?"

Brian didn't pretend he didn't know what she was talking about. He turned a page. "Great."

"I heard it didn't go so well."

He glanced at her and shrugged. "Then why did you ask?"

Ana actually smiled. How long ago was it since she shot and killed Shannon? "It's called being polite."

Being polite was overrated. Brian could say 'please do this for me' how many times he wanted but would still mean 'do this or I'll freaking take your head and smash it against this table'. So Brian scowled at her.

"I guess you aren't in such a good mood right?"

"Let's see..." Brian put down the book. "I went to help my best friend. Then he and I got kidnapped. They let me go but let him stay and now everyone's avoiding me and I think Jack's planning to let Lori murder me in my sleep."

"At least you didn't kill him."

He hated her frankness.

"I just as well did."

"You mean because the others will kill him?"

Brian met her eyes. "No, because they won't save him."

Ana leaned back in the seat and her expression turned smug. "You want revenge or what?"

Brian's eyes narrowed. "Revenge for what?"

"If it weren't for the others – I would never even have a gun to shoot with in the first place. I would've never been scared, Kim would've never freaked out over a twig breaking and she wouldn't have shot Boone – I wouldn't have shot Shannon. They took many of us, the kids – they took your friend Claire. Don't you think it's time to fight back?"

Brian didn't know what to answer. He doubted they would be able to do anything against them. They were too powerful.

Ana's eyes shone with excitement. "The talk is already on. Many are frightened because of the fire and want to be able to fight back. Soon Lalita won't be able to stick around any longer and she'll go to take her daughter back – when that happens, don't you want to be ready? Jack has already started to spread the rumor of an army, and if it comes to it, would you join?"

--

"There's one good way to find out who he is."

"And what's that?" Bonnie put her feet up on the table and leaned back in the couch. They were in the hatch having a meeting, well, those who knew about the freighter guy were.

"We try to trade him for Walt and Flor." Jack looked around at them.

"Didn't you say that we ain't allowed to explore the jungle anymore?" Sawyer asked.

"Yes, I said that but we can just go to the balloon and try to talk to them, either they'll agree and get their member back or they won't – and then we'll know he is who he says he is."

"There's a lot of things wrong with that plan." Locke was sitting on a chair, crutches by his side. "But it's the best one we got right now."

"But he drew us this map… shouldn't we check it out first?"Owen held the piece of paper on her hand.

"As Doc here said, there's apparently an invisible line we can't cross."

"Well, I'm not in the mood for a trek through the jungle." Owen stood up. "See you guys later."

Bonnie glanced at Jack. "I'm willing to go."

Sawyer looked down. "I don't really have the time." He meant he wanted to stay behind for Rosalie.

"Then you and I'll go then Bonnie?"

Bonnie nodded, she looked at Locke. He had a frown on his face and she knew he wanted to come but couldn't because of his leg.

"I just have to do something at the beach first." Jack looked at her.

"Sure, let's go!"

--

Hurley looked like a five year old child finding out that Santa wasn't real when he saw the cargo full with food, while Wendy was almost jumping up and down with excitement.

"It's like Christmas!" she yelled and took up a box with cookies.

"This is so not good."

Bonnie and Sawyer were too busy with the hatch, so was Jack and Locke too. They both suspected there was something strange going on, but like always the A-Team kept to themselves. So when the supply drop had been found, they had only told Wendy and Hurley since they were in charge of the food.

"How can this not be good?" Wendy yelled again as she found apple cider. "With this and the food from the Swan we got more than we can eat!"

"No we don't."

Wendy realized that Hurley actually was stressed and moody. She put the cider down back into the cargo. "What do you mean?"

"Yeah sure this could last a while," he said. "But we're about forty survivors. And these will run out. And before that everyone will be like - why didn't I get any potato chips? Why did you give Zidler the chocolate? And why didn't I get the peanut butter? Then, they'll get really mad and start asking: why does Hugo have everything – why should he get to decide? And they'll all… hate me."

"Hurley!" Wendy managed a weak smile. "It won't be like that. They won't hate you; maybe they'll hate me but definitely not you… C'mon, let's try to inventory this, make it last right?"

"Okay."

They sat down beside each other, notebook in hand and started to write down each thing. Wendy grabbed a candy bar and took a bite. Hurley stared at her.

"It's not melted, strange," she said and took another one.

--

"It's _Zidler._"

"Zidaah?"

"It's not that hard to pronounce!" Zidler whined. Stomped his foot in the ground and rushed off.

Andrea gaped after him as he left.

"Whatever you may think, that's actually no unusual behavior from his side," Charlie told her. "Just wait until he sees a guy talking to Margo, then you'll see crazy."

Andrea laughed. She had tried to fix up her shelter but it was no good, somehow the things she managed to get, disappeared. She suspected it was Sawyer's fault. Charlie though had been helpful and gotten up some sort of wall on at least one side of her shelter.

"It's hard to remember everyone's names. I always confuse Steve and Scott."

"Um… Actually one of them is dead. I think it's Steve… I'm not that sure –" Charlie suddenly went silent and stared at something behind her. Andrea looked over her shoulder and saw Brian walk across the camp, apparently to get some food. Just as he arrived at the camp's kitchen all the people who had been there scattered and he was left alone.

"That guy's really weird. You know that he was pretty hurt a while ago, he was going to die and then he just appeared in the jungle in front of me and Flor without a scratch on him, miraculously healed. If I didn't know he was on the manifest I would say he was here before us."

"Manifest?" Andrea raised her eyebrows in question.

Charlie nodded. "We had this flight manifest with a list of all the passengers, that's how we figured out that Ethan wasn't one of us. Unfortunately when Sayid thought Claret was one of them the manifest disappeared."

"So… anyone of you could be an other?"

"Some think that."

--

Kaylee sat against a tree on the beach with a book in her lap. It was one of the books from the hatch, The Turn of the Screw. She didn't really get what the title had to do with the plot, but she was intrigued. A shadow blocked the sun away from her, she looked up and saw the blonde Australian stand before her.

"Hey… um… Claire! Hey – stop! What are you doing?"

Claire grabbed Kaylee's arm and placed it over her shoulder. "Stand up."

"Claire?" Kay said weakly. "Remember, I can't."

"You just gotta try!" the Australian said with determination and took the book from her. "I will hold onto you and help you, so try to stand!"

Kaylee wanted to yell at her, but she held back the glares and the words and gritted her teeth. With the help of Claire and a lot of effort she tried to pull herself up on her feet.

"See, its working!" She smiled.

"You're practically carrying me Claire," Kay replied and crashed down on her knees again. Claire fell down with her and Kay closed her eyes. She was panting with the effort it had been.

"What…" Claire was trying to pull her up again. "Wasn't that enough?"

Claire shook her head. "No it was not, c'mon!"

Kaylee growled with irritation, but secretly she appreciated the help she got from the girl. They both had a connection now, with the fire that she couldn't really explain. But as she leaned onto Claire again, she this time managed to stand on one of her shivering legs.

--

"Hello Sunshine."

Lalita responded by slapping Sawyer on the shoulder and bury her head in her hands. "I'm not in the mood for nicknames right now."

Sawyer sighed deeply and sat down beside her. "Look, I've known you for about ten years give or take and, before you start screaming at me like usual I gotta tell you, you are the most overprotective damn person in the world!"

Lalita opened her mouth to protest but Sawyer continued before she managed to speak: "Listen, you are letting Queenie sit inside her tent all day, not leaving her outta your sight. Bringing food, water everything to her. She gotta get out, and I know that you're now gonna give me all that crap of that she needs to have time to mourn, 'it's not even been a week', well, on this island bad things happen. And you gotta get over it quickly; you learned that the hard way, it's time for her to learn that too."

Lalita had a million of things to throw in Sawyer's face, but instead she swallowed and looked away. "I just want to protect her."

"I know, I know. But one day she's gonna need to protect herself. If you just let her."

"Okay. I'll go get her now." Lalita stood up and turned around to go back to the tent. "Wait!" she shouted and swung around and grabbed Sawyer's arm for a second, then she began to walk away again.

"What was that?"

"It was a half-hug!" she said and laughed.

----

"Hi, it's me Rosalie."

"_Rosie!"_

Rosalie blushed even though she was talking in the phone. The nickname sounded so different when Lalita said it, sweeter and strangely enough natural. She leaned back in the couch. "I got your message."

"_I'm sorry if I sounded really stressed, but I still hope you aren't too worried about the dress. It's fine."_

"Yeah, of course. So about spending the day together…"

"_Yes?"_ Lalita's voice was full of anxiety.

"Um, I w-would really like to… do that." Oh why did she have to become a blubbering idiot whenever she was talking to the woman. "It's just…"

Rosalie glanced from her bedroom into the kitchen; her daughter was sitting on a high chair, colorful crayons on her side and paper that she was an expert to avoid. The table was always full of her drawings, but as soon as the little girl smiled Rosalie would forget all about it.

"Can I bring someone else too?"

"_Oh… yes, of course you can."_

The rain smattered down and smudged her makeup and Lalita knew she looked ridiculous. She ran into the apartment building and looked at her reflection in the glass door. She looked something like a clown, but less funny.

Luckily enough she had some tissues in her purse and she quickly wiped it off and tired to make herself at least not look too hideous. She glanced at the rain, now was not a good time to spend outdoors.

With a shivering hand she pressed the doorbell.

"Eva can you answer that?" Lalita heard giggles after Rosalie's shout and all blood rushed from her face. Eva. As in a name. As in a girl's name. Rosalie couldn't be with someone else right? No, she was ridiculous. It was surely just the friend she meant.

Lalita blinked as the door opened and looked down. A little girl stood there in the doorway and Lalita felt her heart melt at the sight of her. She looked so much like Rosalie, but she had light brown hair instead of the red shade Rosie had but that smile, so big and happy.

"Hello," the girl chirped and giggled.

"Hello!" Lalita grinned back, it was impossible not to.

The girl wasn't shy at all. "You are one of Mama's friends!"

"Yes I am, Rosie, hey."

Rosalie looked shy; it was cute seeing how the little girl was so outgoing while her mother was the opposite at the moment. "Hey, pumpkin can you go in to your room and play while Mama and her friend Lalita talk?"

Eva nodded eagerly. "Okay!" She skipped off and closed the door behind her.

They sat down by the kitchen table. Lalita traced the drawings with her hand and gazed at Rosalie.

"That was my daughter," she told her.

Lalita smiled. "She's lovely."

Rosalie smiled too. "Yes she really is." Rosalie's smile faded and she cleared her throat, closed her hands on the table and met Lalita's eyes. "There's something I need to tell you."

And before Rosalie began to tell her of the rape, her pregnancy and of Eva. Lalita knew that whatever it was Rosalie would tell her didn't matter.

She already knew she would stay with her forever.

----

"Kate."

Kate folded the now dry shirt and stood up to meet Jack. "Hey Jack – what?"

Jack grabbed her arm harshly and she tried to wriggle herself free.

"We need to talk," he whispered. Kate looked at him. She was angry but she followed him a bit into the jungle, behind the trees where no one could hear them.

"What was it you wanted to talk about?"

"This." Jack held up the mug shot and Kate looked away. She didn't want to see it. She thought that whole deal was over with, that he just could accept it and move on, clearly he couldn't.

"What about it?"

He took a step forward. "You were a criminal, I don't know what you did but… there was a fire."

Kate's eyes widened. "What? Are you accusing me of setting Claire's shelter on fire?"

"Did you?"

Kate scowled at him. "In case you've forgotten Kaylee was in that fire. I would never – I can't believe you would, you know I would never hurt her!"

"That's the thing Kate," he said. "I don't know you."

--

"Rosie, it's me."

Lalita crawled into the tent. Her wife was laying there, legs curled up to her chest and closed eyes that tried so hard to keep back the tears running down her face. When Lalita came in Rosalie closed her eyes even harder and let out a whimper. It was like her heart broke, watching the one she loved the most in such pain, in such sorrow.

"It's just me, it's just me," Lalita whispered. Reached out a hand and stroke the long, brown hair back so she could see her face better. "I'm here. It's okay. Rosie you're safe."

She lay down beside her wife, her head resting on her shoulder, kissing it softly. "I'm here."

"But she isn't."

And Lalita didn't know if it was Shannon she meant, or Eva.

----

The dry, orange and brown leaves crunched underneath their feet as Lalita and Eva walked along the avenue. Some of the trees still had some color on them, but most of them were naked but still, as the cold autumn air made them both shiver underneath their jackets, it was beautiful.

They sat down together on a park bench, both with one ice cream. Lalita smiled as she watched the girl finish off hers, Rosalie hated to eat cold things when it was chilly outside. While Lalita and Eva didn't think weather had anything to do with chocolate flavor on their ice creams.

"Eva," said Lalita with a serious voice, "there's a reason for why I took you to spend the day with me."

"A reason more than ice cream?" Eva said and looked wishfully at Lalita's. With a sigh and a smile Lalita gave the girl hers.

"Yes. There's something I have to ask you, and you can answer me whatever you like, I won't get mad and I will still love you."

Eva's eyes were big and she licked her ice cream. "What is it?"

"I want to know, if you would allow me to marry your mother and adopt you."

Eva's big eyes were even bigger and she dropped the ice cream on the ground. She clasped a hand over her mouth. "Really?" she gasped after she removed her hand.

Lalita nodded and hoped it was a good 'really'. "Yes, I would love to become your mother, I love you and I love your mother and there's nothing I'd rather –"

The little girl screamed, (which made several people passing by stare at her) and hugged Lalita, jumping up and down on the park bench and she continued to shout. "YES! Yes, yes, yes!"

----

"Hey Eko." Allen walked up to the man by the trees. Eko was marking trees with an 'x' and was looking very concentrated on what he was doing.

"Hello," Eko answered and marked another tree.

"What are you doing?" Allen decided he wanted to get to know the man his daughter was so fond of. "Why are you marking the trees?"

"I am marking the ones I like." He smiled and Al smiled back even though he found the whole thing strange.

"Need some help?" he asked.

--

Kay leaned back against the tree with a relieved sigh, she was sweating and the warmth really was horrible now after she'd pushed herself so much. Claire offered her a water bottle which she gratefully accepted.

"Why are you helping me so much?" Kay asked and drank.

"Because," the grin on Claire's face was smug, something she'd never seen on the girl before, "you're going to help me."

Kay took another sip. "With what?"

"Libby helped me with triggering my memories, I remember a lot now… I remember where they took me."

Kay's eyes widened. "Where?"

"A medical station," Claire said thoughtful, "and when you can walk again, we're going there."

Kay was still surprised by how Claire acted, so sure of the fact that Kaylee would help her – maybe the fire had changed her mind instead of harming her body. Maybe she was so determined now because she felt the need to become that way to protect her son, it had been such luck that he was with Rosalie when the flames took over.

"Owen too?"

Claire's eyes went dark. "Why would Owen come along?"

Kay was confused. "I thought you were friends."

"Yeah… well, Owen's not coming with us."

"If you want me to come you have to give me some more information. What exactly do you remember?"

"I remember Ethan, he… he drugged me but I remember it more clearly. They wanted Aaron – they were going to cut him out of me. I remember more about Owen too."

"And those things you remember about Owen makes you not trust her?"

Claire nodded. "At least not for now."

"It all sounds crazy you know, but if I can walk again – then I'll use any excuse to be up on my legs. I'm in."

"In on what?"

Kaylee looked over her shoulder at Sean; he smiled sheepishly and held out two coconuts. Claire accepted one warily and Kay did the same.

"On something," Claire answered him slowly.

"What something?"

"Just something we're going to do."

"What something you're going to do?"

"Just something we're going to do to something."

"I'm confused," Kaylee interrupted them. "I and Claire are going on a mission! Like the A-Team!" Claire glared at Kaylee but she ignored her.

"What kind of mission?" Sean asked them.

"A something mission," Claire said quickly.

Kay rolled her eyes. "We're going to the place Claire and Owen were taken to when they were kidnapped."

Sean looked surprised. "You remember? You know where it is?"

Claire nodded. "Yes I do. But I'm not going to tell you."

Sean frowned in confusion. "Why?"

"Because then you'll tell Jack or Locke and then they'll go on a mission without me and Kay, and I want to go. All everyone else does is going on missions and I want to do that too! So when Kaylee can walk we're going."

"Can I come?"

Kay exchanged looks with Claire before she turned to Sean. "You know that they probably don't have Flor there?"

Sean nodded. "Yes I get that."

"Then you can come, but first –" Claire smiled. "Kaylee gotta walk."

"Then we better help her!"

Kaylee scowled as they both tried to help her stand again.

--

"You ready?" Jack asked her.

Bonnie glanced sideways at the tent Lalita and Rosalie shared together, she missed her friend. But she had barely said a word to Rosalie since she came back. She didn't know what to say. I'm sorry wasn't enough, or I feel your pain or any other phrases could make up for what happened to Shannon.

Bonnie tried grin, Jack looked scared. She probably looked crazy. "Yeah I'm ready."

"Bonnie!"

Bonnie swung around and she and Jack stopped. Wendy panted and grabbed Bonnie's shoulder.

"I have to talk with you!"

Bonnie frowned. "Can it wait? We're going on a mission."

"It can _so_ not wait." Bonnie threw an apologizing look at Jack and followed Wendy away between a couple of palm trees.

"What is so important? I thought you were off with Hurley helping with the food…"

Wendy's cheeks were red and it was very unusual for her to look so embarrassed. "I need something from Sawyer's stash."

"Oh," Bonnie said. "Sorry Wendy but his stash was taken by Owen and Fox… but really just Owen."

"What?" Wendy squeaked in a very un-Wendy like manner. "But, but I need it now!"

"What is it you need?"

If it was possible Wendy turned even redder in the face. "I'll… I'll just go and ask Owen then."

Bonnie looked confused after her as she left and Jack approached her.

"What was that about?"

"No idea," Bonnie replied and together they went into the jungle.

--

"Dom," Kate breathed.

Dom glanced at his sister and smiled broadly. "You have to try these weird fruit or whatever Kim found in the jungle, they're amazing."

"Dom!" Kate gave him the usual 'we need to talk look' and with a last longing look at the fruit he followed her away from the camp's kitchen.

"What's going on Katie?"

"Jack… he's blaming the fire on me."

"He is what?" Dom shouted.

Kate nodded. "I think he's going to tell everyone… no one will trust us."

"It's him they won't trust."

Kate stared at her brother with big eyes. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to take care of you little sister."

--

"Step away from him!" So Wendy didn't exactly know what Sawyer had been saying to Fox, but that poor guy was getting paler by the second while stuttering more and more so really, she was doing him a favor.

Surprisingly, all Sawyer did was to give her four new nicknames, sneer at Fox before he left to change his personality just in time to talk to Rosalie.

Wendy turned to Fox who still was probably shaken up after Sawyer speaking to him. "Have you seen Owen?"

Fox was still really pale and kept looking over his shoulder like he was paranoid. "W-why are you asking m-me?"

"Because you're her friend?"

Fox blinked. "Owen and I-I aren't fr-friends!"

Wendy rolled her eyes. "Fox, you _are_ friends."

Fox blinked nervously again. "W-when did that happen?"

Wendy raised an eyebrow. "Anyway, do you know?"

Fox shook his head. "I-I saw her around some-somewhere."

Wendy sighed. "I need something from Sawyer's old stash; I don't suppose you got access to it?"

"You talking about me?" Owen casually put an arm around Fox who if it was possible, looked even paler.

Wendy's gaze flickered. "Um... yes, I need something from the stash."

"Okay," said Owen.

"Okay?" said Wendy.

"Really?" said Fox.

"Yeah, just what is that you want?"

Wendy glanced at Fox. "Uh… can I talk to you alone Owen?"

"No, now I'm intrigued." Owen beamed. "If you want it you have to tell in front of Fox."

Wendy realized she had no way to get out of it. She took a deep breath. "Ineedapregnancytest."

"A what?"

"A pregnancy test." Wendy tried her hardest not to blush but she felt warm in her face. Fox had his mouth open in shock and even Owen's eyes widened in surprise.

"Oh dear, Bonnie's gonna kill the guy who knocked you up," said Owen and left with Wendy to get the test.

--

"Did you know," Sawyer told Charlie and Andrea, "that to get a gun you got to get through Jack and Locke first?"

"Aren't the guns at the hatch?" Charlie asked.

"Not anymore, Saint Jack and Johnny Boy got them hidden away from the rest of the people."

Charlie frowned. "They're not our leaders! They can't decide that!"

"Tell that to them. And now Jackass got this idea that he's going to train an army."

"I actually think it's a good idea, the army thing," said Andrea.

"I ain't got a problem with the army, I got a problem with the fact that a man who threatened an innocent woman with a gun is gonna lead it."

"He did what?" Andrea yelped.

"I'll tell you the whole story," Charlie said and started to explain to her.

Sawyer smirked, he knew that they were going to complain to others, and those others would complain further and so the whole camp would be angry. Great.

--

Rosalie's chest rose in even breaths, her eyes now closed in rest and not in pain, sleeping peacefully.

Lalita let out a sigh of relief and gently sat up; she glanced at her wife, glad that she at least could find some stillness in her sleep. But as soon as that thought crossed her mind Rosalie began to whimper.

It was too familiar, the way the swat broke from her upper lip and how she started to twist. Caught up in a nightmare that was so horrible she couldn't wake up.

But it had been better, days and years went and Rosalie didn't have the nightmares anymore. Yet, now she was.

"Rosie…" Lalita gently touched her shoulder, of course it didn't work. "Rosie!" she said louder and shook Rosalie's body, now intent on getting her wake.

Rosalie cried out, her eyes opened and she pulled her hair, desperate, the ghosts of the dream still inside of her head. Lalita grabbed her arms and pulled her up, embraced her, held her still. "You are safe now. No one can hurt you. I'm here. You are safe now, you are safe…. remember you are safe I will never let anyone hurt you."

And usually Rosalie would continue on crying, scream and beg, her mind still wrapped around the image of the man raping her.

But this time she pulled away from the hug and gazed tearfully into Lalita's eyes.

"I know."

----

Lalita took a deep breath and looked at the engagement ring, the nice woman at the store said it was a beautiful, precious thing and she hoped dearly that Rosalie would think the same.

She picked her up by her apartment, smiled and blinked knowingly at Eva who giggled and she and Rosalie decided to walk the way to the romantic, quite expensive restaurant. It was a long walk, but Rosalie kept talking but Lalita couldn't hear what she was saying. All she could concentrate on was the ring in her purse.

What she did notice was when the rain began to fall and they both, in high heels and dresses had to run into the restaurant to avoid it.

When they were seated at the table Lalita felt the panic, that she'd felt since she bought the ring get even bigger. Rosalie was lovely as always, but the way her eyes narrowed showed that she knew something was up.

"Yes it's a wonderful weather," Lalita said and nervously took a sip of the wine.

Rosalie looked curious at her. "I wasn't talking about the weather, and it's awful out there. Are you okay Lita?"

Lalita nodded. Was this the moment?

"There's a fly in my soup!" A man in the next table screamed.

"Isn't that a joke?" Lalita whispered to Rosalie, but Rosalie was already standing up.

"Let's go."

"What? Rosie I'm sure there's no fly –"

"It's a RAT!" the waiter shouted.

Quickly, Rosalie and Lalita left the restaurant, and outside it was raining like hell. They tried to get a cab, but the other restaurant guests were faster and soon they found themselves alone on the street, irritated and soaked to the bone with freezing rain.

"This was so not supposed to happen," Lalita muttered to herself.

"What?" Rosalie shouted over the rain.

"Nothing!" Lalita answered her girlfriend, shuddering.

Rosalie wrapped her arms around herself. "What was supposed to happen?"

Lalita glanced at her. "It doesn't matter."

Rosalie looked away at the unfriendly tone in her voice. Lalita swallowed.

"Sorry!"

"Maybe we should call someone! You have your phone right?" Rosalie took Lalita's purse from her hand before she could stop her and opened it. Terrified she watched her dig around for her cell.

"It must be around somewhere –" Rosalie gasped.

Lalita closed her eyes and opened them again. "It's not what you think."

Rosie stared at the diamond ring, mouth open and her hair plastered around her face, how she still managed to be so beautiful Lalita had no idea.

"It's an engagement ring."

"Yes, yes it is."

"Were you going to propose?"

Lalita took a deep breath. It was now or never. "Yes, yes I was." She took the ring right out of her hands. She looked down at the ground, it was wet and dirty. But hell, she was already drenched.

"You don't have to kneel." Rosalie laughed.

Lalita went down on one knee, her dress heavy from the water and she held up the ring. It wasn't perfect. They were in the middle of a street in the middle of a waterfall. But all that mattered was that Rosalie was before her, the smile on her lips and the life in her eyes.

"Rosie," she said, "will you marry me?"

----

Kaylee, Claire and Sean screamed in a very high-pitched not particularly dignified manner when Kaylee managed to take four steps. The rest of the camp had long ago accepted the craziness of the three and the fact that Claire and Sean acted like happy parents seeing their baby take its first step.

Dom watched from afar with a raised eyebrow that had been there for what had to be fifteen minutes. "Great, now can you please just stop?"

Kay threw him one of those glares she and Kate savored just for him. "Why are you so against me trying to walk anyway?"

"It's math."

Claire looked at him disbelieving. "Math?"

"Yes, who gets into trouble on this island?"

"Um… everyone?"

"Not everyone. People who walk. Rosalie started walking – and all the sudden evil things are happening to her. And when people walk, they walk to places like _stupid missions _and get kidnapped. Simple logic. So the math – legs plus people equal trouble."

"You are the stupid one," Claire said and the three of them completely ignored his speech.

"Is it going well?" Claret grinned and held up the basket with food she brought.

"Now there's someone who appreciates us!" Sean said and happily started eating the mango.

Dom rolled his eyes. "I'm off. Got to plan how to kill a doctor, see you!"

Claire stared at him as he left. "He's not really gonna kill a doctor right?"

"Claire, Claire, Claire," Kay shook her head. "This is Dom we're talking about."

"Yes," Claret agreed. "He will probably make a slow-motion killing machine."

--

Wendy told Hurley she would just go to the beach to get water, it had gone a long time since then and as soon she got the test in her hands she remembered. She'd rushed the fastest she could back to the cargo and hoped Hurley hadn't died from dehydration.

He hadn't, instead he apparently had gotten a hold of an axe.

"Hurley?" she shrieked. "What are you doing?"

"I'm gonna to destroy it," he told her. "I'm gonna end the food."

"End the food?" she said in the same high-pitched tone. "Are you crazy? There's no ending the food you eat it or…"

Hurley looked at her. "I'm not crazy!"

"Hurley –"

"Everyone's fighting amongst themselves Wendy! No one trusts anyone anymore! With Shannon and those other survivors and the hatch and the fire – nothing is the same anymore. We don't need another problem!"

"Um… Hurley can you just point the axe another way?"

"No, I got to ruin it now!"

Wendy walked closer to him. "Hurley, why are you so upset about this?"

Hurley took a deep breath. "I don't want to let anyone down."

"You're not going to let anyone down."

"How?"

"I think I got an idea."

--

"Jack."

"Yeah?" Jack stepped through the long, green grass that reached up to his waist. Bonnie was walking behind him; they were both tired and sweating from the burning sun above them, but at least it wasn't raining.

"Someone is following us – hey, don't stop!" she hissed. "Continue to walk okay? Just look forward."

Jack hesitated but Bonnie pushed him hard in the back, he stumbled over his feet but managed to go on. "Where?" he asked in a whisper.

"In the trees, by our left, I just noticed her."

Jack tried very hard not to glance that way, but he couldn't help it but all he saw was broad, dark trees surrounding them.

"We gotta move fast. Duck and shoot okay?"

"Okay."

Bonnie inhaled deeply. "On the count of three."

"One," he whispered and rested his hand on the gun by his side, "two –"

"STOP!"

The woman ran out from the trees and Bonnie fired the gun straight at her, she ducked and the bullet pierced the tree behind her. "STOP!" she yelled again. "I'm not going to hurt you – please!"

Jack and Bonnie ran towards her quickly, she had her own gun but she wasn't pointing it at them.

"Up!" Jack gripped his weapon with strong force. The woman nodded and slowly rose from the ground. She wore simple grey clothes and a black jacket. Her hair was long and brown just as her skin.

She put the gun down on the ground while looking directly into his eyes. "I'm not here to harm you."

"Who are you?" Bonnie snapped at the woman.

"Just calm down," she said in her thick accent. Jack couldn't quite place it, English maybe. The woman squinted. "Are you Bonnie McQueen?"

Somehow Jack got the impression that this girl wasn't one of the others. The way she was dressed and how she had come out from the jungle willingly didn't seem like them. He still pointed the gun at her though.

Bonnie nodded warily in answer to the woman's question. The woman's face broke up in a smile and she laughed, it wasn't a beautiful noise, it was hoarse and the smile was just too broad, too bright.

"No kidding. You must be the survivors! The survivors from flight 815?"

Jack glanced at Bonnie and then back at the woman. "Yes that's us."

"That's amazing, my name is Naomi Dorrit, and I'm here to rescue you guys!"

--

"Go on then."

Lalita grinned and slipped her hand into her wife's. Rosalie smiled weakly back and together they walked between the survivor's shelters and tents, between two trees and stopped in front of a shelter in construction.

"Hello."

"Oh hey Lali –" Ana-Lucia stopped in mid-sentence and stared at Rosalie.

Lalita gave her an encouraging look. Rosalie held out a bowl, in it was a coconut, two mangos and a few pieces of the fruit that the survivors named after Kim who found it.

Ana-Lucia gawked, then closed her mouth and gently accepted it without a word. They looked at each other for a second, then Ana-Lucia looked away and Rosalie gripped her wife's hand tighter and they left her.

Lalita didn't feel like this was a time for words, so instead she cupped her wife's face in her hands and kissed her.

----

"…And that's why I'll always love you."

Lalita glanced at the people sitting on the seats. Tearful eyes just for Rosalie's speech, and it was a beautiful speech. If Lalita hadn't been so nervous she would also cry with happiness. But now, all faces were turned to her, because now it was her turn.

"Um…"

The priest looked at her encouraging and Lalita found herself all the sudden avoiding her fiancée's gaze. "Um…" she said again.

She heard someone shift in their seat, someone sniff and another one clear his throat. They made it harder to think. She'd written the speech, prepared herself for it and now it was all gone in her head in the spur of the moment.

Finally Lalita gazed at Rosie. And she felt her heart skip a beat just like when Rosie had first gone through the church, the white dress contrasting beautifully against her darker skin and her hair falling like a waterfall with locks and that huge, adoring smile.

To hell with speeches. There was no way she would be able to express in words what she felt for Rosie.

Instead she gripped Rosalie's shoulders and kissed her. Laughter was heard and happy shouts of appreciation. Lalita grinned against her lips and then pulled back.

The priest looked a little stunned, and stumbled on the words until the very end.

"So, err, um… I now pronounce you married, you may kiss… again."

Rosalie grinned and they both happily obliged.

----

"So…" Margo stared at Wendy.

Wendy stared back. "So…"

"How long has it gone?"

"I think it's gone enough time."

They both looked at each other for a little while longer, then, simultaneously their eyes went to the pregnancy test between them.

They both gasped.

"Congratulations… you're pregnant!"

Margo grabbed the pregnancy test and slammed it against the sand.

"What – Margo – what the hell?"

Margo continued to hit the ground with it, and then she stopped and stared at it again. "Damn!"

"It's not going away just because you're abusing it. You're pregnant!" Wendy told her friend.

"Wanna bet?" Margo looked around after a rock.

"Margo…" Wendy took Margo's wrist gently and took the test from her shivering hands. "You are pregnant."

Margo shook her head. "No."

"Yes."

"No!"

"Yes you are!"

"Am not!"

"Am so!"

Margo put a hand on her belly and looked down at it.

"OH MY GOD I'M PREGNANT!"

Wendy almost fell off the shock of the scream. "I thought we established that."

"No… I can't be pregnant… I can't…"

They glared at each other; it was a battle of who was going to blink first. Margo lost when she began to blink back the tears. "I can't," she whispered and turned her face away.

Wendy shifted closer and put an arm around her friend. "You are."

Margo leaned against her shoulder. "Well I can't be! It's not bloody fair okay! I'm too young to be pregnant! I'm on an island in the middle of nowhere and now you're telling me… that stupid test is telling me that I'm pregnant which I am not!" She sobbed and her whole body shook and her face was red with anger. "I can't be!"

"It's not that bad you know."

"Not that bad? For the tears I'm crying… Do I have to remind you that the last pregnant woman was KIDNAPPED and forced to give birth in the jungle!"

"It's not that bad by the fact that you got people to take care of you."

Margo blinked and looked at Wendy. "I have?"

Wendy laughed and dried the girl's tears away. "Yes you do. You got me and you got Zidler and I bet the entire camp will help you out until we get rescued."

Margo's lips curled up in a weak smiled and Wendy hugged the girl. They sat together watching as the light disappeared from the sun in the horizon and how the world around them quickly fell dark. By the camp the survivors were starting fires to light up the night.

"Can I ask you one question?"

Margo nodded. "Sure."

"Who's the father?"

Margo's whole body tensed. "Um… err… it's… uh… a one nightstand, off the island obviously, no one to worry about."

"Oh, okay."

Margo glanced at her. "Who did you think it was?"

"I just figured it was Zidler."

Margo looked sad for a moment but then she let out a laugh. "Oh no, he's totally in love with you."

Wendy frowned. "He isn't in love with me."

"Yeah he is! He told me that."

Wendy raised an eyebrow. "When?"

"Well this time when… " Margo's eyes widened. "Wait, he has actually never said that."

"You see?" Wendy said. Margo chuckled, sniffed and dried her tears away with the sleeve of her grey jacket.

"I have something growing inside of me," she said tearfully but with a smile on her face.

"Let's just hope it doesn't turn out like Aliens."

Margo stared at her.

"Too early for jokes?"

"Too early for jokes."

"Come on let's get back to the camp." Wendy helped Margo stand up and the girl brushed off some sand off her clothes.

"Wait, Wendy…" Margo said as she began to walk back. She turned around.

"Yeah?"

The girl hugged her. "Thanks."

"You're welcome." Wendy began to pull herself away from the hug, bur Margo held her tightly.

"And there's this one little thing I have to ask of you."

"What is it?"

"If anyone asks you're the pregnant one!" Margo began to skip away but Wendy ran after her.

"Wait – what?"

Margo rolled her eyes. "Well you can't seriously expect me to tell everyone I'm pregnant when they think it's you."

Wendy began to stammer incoherent words. Margo just smiled. "You're the best."

"I didn't even agree to anything!" Wendy shouted after her.

--

"Hey!" Zidler grinned and he put a friendly arm around her as she sat down by the fire. Margo smiled and glanced up at Wendy, standing by their side, looking unsure if to sit or not. Apparently Zidler had yet heard the rumor of the pregnancy test.

"Sit down," Margo said gently but Wendy looked at her side. Hurley came up to them, a bag of chips in his hand. "You guys want some?"

Zidler shot up and Margo almost fell backwards at the force. "YES!"

Hurley grinned even broader than Zidler and made his way over to where Brian sat alone. He was trying to make up a fire by himself. Without a word Hurley put a jar of peanut butter in his hand before he moved on to the next group.

Kaylee was leaning on Dom's shoulder with her eyes closed a blanket wrapped around her. Claire laughed at something Sean said. Kate glanced at the jungle, her eyes full of worry and then at her brother, who with a gentle hand was stroking Kay's hair. She laughed as Hurley handed them the cookies and Claire grabbed one immediately.

"I got some peanut butter."

The laughter stopped immediately and suspicious eyes turned towards Brian. Claire took the jar in her hands and smiled. "Sit," she said and he sat down beside her.

Lalita took Rosalie's hand and led her to another group of survivors. Andrea was playing around with Charlie's guitar, Libby was staring at Hurley handing out the food and Allen and Ellie were listening intently to one of Eko's stories while chewing on the Apollo bars.

Kim looked around at the survivors. She saw them smiling, laughing. She tried to see someone else, maybe sitting a little bit on the side, stuttering, maybe smiling cutely.

"Kimika!" Kim swung around at Lori's shout and saw her sitting with Owen, Claret, Rose and Bernard, a strange mix that she never thought she would see. Awkwardly she walked over to them, accepted the cup of cider and drank. Owen was telling them something about the girl Wendy, she heard the word pregnancy.

She turned her gaze to the jungle again and frowned. Something was not right.

--

It was dark in the jungle, but the torch lighting up Fox's way helped him avoid the hollows in the ground and the trees.

He tried very hard not to stumble or fall clumsily; his bruises ached on his arms and over his body. A reminder that kept him always awake, always aware.

How stupid had he been, to believe that Ben was done with him? That they, his old people would let him just live happily with the survivors. Of course there'd been than rising feeling that something was bound to happen, but he thought – that at least when that was done with, he wouldn't have to follow their orders anymore.

And then there was Ethan, angry, mad, knowing just how to make Fox obey his every word. By threats. Threatening to lock him up, threatening to kill his friends.

"Took longer than expected," a voice said in amusement. Fox yelped at the sound of the voice and held the torch in front of him, he saw Sawyer, leaning against a tree with a smug look on his face.

Fox scowled at Sawyer. "It's all in-in your t-tent now."

"Oh is it?" Sawyer smirked and moved closer to Fox.

He nodded gravely. "Yes."

"Not that it wasn't great doing business with you kid, but you know I ain't letting you off the hook just yet?"

Fox nodded again and looked the southerner into his eyes. "I-I know."

"If I want something, you'll help me get it. If I ask something you'll do it for me. Are we clear?"

Fox looked down. Similar words. Similar orders. All that was left to make it a complete déjà vu was for Sawyer to beat him up.

"Do you want everyone to know what you did to those two poor women? I said are we clear?"

"Yes!"

Sawyer fingered with the gun in his hand and cast a devilish look at Fox, obviously enjoying torturing the physicist. "I still got questions Foxy. And the most important of them are, why?"

"Why what?"

Sawyer smirked again. "Did you drop a match? Had a fight with one of them or were you just feelin' the fire calling you?"

"J-Just give me the g-gun."

"Okey-dokey." He handed him the gun. "Pleasure doing business with you, looking forward to the next time."

Fox stared as Sawyer left through the jungle to return to the camp. The light of his torch leaving him. Fox inspected his gun, the bullets, the trigger. The deadly weapon now his. He could've gotten it another way, tricked it off Jack, forgotten to return it to Locke.

But he couldn't risk letting Sawyer tell everyone he was responsible for the fire in Claire's shelter.

--

**Author's Notes:** I thought everyone would guess Margo's pregnancy after she and Dom slept together. I was very surprised when I posted the chapter and no one guessed actually, still awesome to hear you caught up on it though!

Thank you all so much for your reviews, an enormous hug for you guys! Seriously more than a hundred reviews is like… WOW, more than I could ever ask for and now it's heading to 200 and just… THANK YOU ALL.

And sorry for not updating sooner, my excuse is… a very good one.

New guessing game! What do you think happened to Boone?

And, I'm thinking about maybe posting deleted scenes from the chapters that I took out as a Christmas gift sort of… maybe.

Namaste.


	23. Through My Fingers

I stand amid the roar  
Of a surf-tormented shore,  
And I hold within my hand  
Grains of the golden sand—  
How few! yet how they creep  
Through my fingers to the deep,  
While I weep—while I weep!

_O God! can I not grasp  
Them with a tighter clasp?  
O God! can I not save  
One from the pitiless wave?  
Is all that we see or seem  
But a dream within a dream?_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 21, Through My Fingers**

--

"Something is blocking the signal," Naomi said and tapped the satellite phone with her finger. "I should at least be able to see where my companion is."

They were close to the camp. While the man they had in the hatch had been wary about answering questions, Naomi were full of quick answers and was very professional at the way she was acting around them, almost too professional. It wasn't everyday you came across crash survivors was it? But maybe, maybe they were really getting rescued.

"Your companion?" Bonnie asked. "There was someone else with you on the chopper?"

Naomi nodded. "I jumped out earlier than her, hopefully her phone is working and she should be able to see where I am at least. I just have to hope she will find me." She looked up and saw their grim faces. "You look disappointed."

Jack wasn't ready to fully trust the woman yet. But her coming here was a confirmation that the man in the hatch wasn't one of the freighter folk, but one of the others.

"Do you have someone named Frederic Phelps on your boat?" Bonnie asked her.

"Phelps… yeah, we got a guy named that." Naomi nodded to herself. "He's not on this island though."

Jack pulled away a branch for them and Bonnie and Naomi avoided it. "Are you sure?"

"Yes… I and Jóhanna are the only ones here… Why do you ask?"

Jack met Bonnie's eyes. "No reason."

Naomi's eyebrows shot up. "You guys got trust issues. I thought you would be more happy about me coming here –"

"Why is it that you got a gun?" Bonnie snapped.

"I got it as a precaution."

"Against what?" Jack asked quickly.

"Against dangers. Like you, you got guns too."

They reached the outskirts of the camp and Jack relaxed for one moment. He was tired, sweaty and all he wanted was to sleep. But there were things he had to do first. Naomi's appearance changed things completely. Rescue seemed like a possibility. But he had to deal with the imposter before he could relax for more than just a few seconds.

The survivors flocked around them. Curious faces, and questions were shot at them.

"You'll watch her?" Jack whispered to Bonnie who nodded.

"Are you going to the hatch?"

Jack sighed. "Yes."

--

After the survivors laughed, cheered and hugged each other in the joy of finally finding rescue Naomi's own smile faded a bit and she glanced at Bonnie.

"Uh… there's this one thing," she said. "They actually found your plane in the bottom of the ocean, and all the passengers dead…"

"But we're alive," Claret said confused.

"Of course you are alive. But the rest of the world doesn't think so, well, except for Penelope Widmore."

A gasp was heard from Lori and Wendy.

"It was her who sent us on this mission to save you – but, it's all good now," she assured them as the survivor's became worried. "You aren't dead."

"So we're all getting on the boat?"

"As soon as I can contact my people."

Sean looked around at the reactions; some seemed less happy now, maybe they were too afraid to hope. He gazed at Lalita, a cold expression on her face as she watched Naomi. She was probably thinking the same thing he was, _what about them? The taken ones?_

But he couldn't help but feel like his heart leaped of happiness at the thought of getting rescued.

----

Her real name was Elizabeth Allens. She had a beautiful laugh, beaming smile and she also had a knack for getting on Sean's nerves. Sean tried his hardest to get along with his girlfriend Sarah's best friend. But she was just…

"Today this very big Labrador started to bark outside this store at me, you couldn't believe how loud it was. And this nice old man tried to silence it and it bit him, clashed its teeth into his hand, blood everywhere. And you know what the owner did? Just took the dog and walked away with it, didn't even call an ambulance, so of course I had to do it. And I followed him in to get stitches and he told me this really amazing life story. He had been a hippie! Can you believe it? Well, that's not the amazing part. He told me he that he actually helped saving the world, of course I thought he was crazy, poor old bloke after losing so much blood! But he kept going on and on about blue vans and sandwiches and I just felt sorry for him! Anyway, as I left the hospital there the dog was! Tied to a lamppost with the owner nowhere in sight! Weird huh?"

But she just talked very, very much and really, really fast. And she always wore pink clothes, _pink,_ like she thought she was a princess. Sean blinked, not really understanding much of what she'd just said. While Sarah clapped her hands together and agreed. How she could stand hanging around Elizabeth Sean had no idea. Maybe it was because they both smoked like crazy.

"Oh way!"

People actually said that? Sean frowned and suddenly both of the girls stood up, gathering their purses.

"What are you doing?"

"Ellie just said that, we're going to see if the dog is still outside the hospital." Sarah rolled her eyes, skipped over to Sean and planted a kiss on his lips. It tasted like cigarettes but Sean didn't care and pulled her closer.

Elizabeth cleared her throat. "You got company! Oh, that's totally what a guy at the mall said to a couple making out and they started to blush and then a security guard –"

The rest of the probably untrue and crazy story was stopped as the door closed behind them. Sean smiled still at the thought of Sarah (he was acting like he was twelve and just had his first crush but he couldn't help it, no matter what Tony tried to do.)

He took the newspaper and opened it, scanning through the articles and reading about the horrible things that happened around the world, which he was going to change. At least Sarah said she believed he would be able to make a difference as a diplomat, and he hoped she would be proven right.

The loud tone of the phone signal rang and he reached for it over the table. "This is Sean O'Donnell."

"_Always so formal."_

"I'm sorry, who is this?"

"_It's your sister Sean, Jane, remember me?"_

"I have a vague memory…" His sister laughed into the phone but he was frowning. It was a long time since they'd talked, they weren't really close.

"_It's nice to hear your voice again," _she said._ "It's been a long time, too long. And you sound weird."_

Sean's smiled. "What do you mean?"

"_You're talking like a Brit trying to speak like an American, shame on you! The least you could do after disappearing off into your little adventures was to keep your real accent, but no. Anyway, I don't have time to blather on even though I'd love to."_

That was his sister all right, at least she didn't have any hard feelings for them losing touch – he hoped.

"_I'm knocked up."_

"You're pregnant? Are you letting me on?"

"_Nope, my nuts husband got me pregnant, hopefully with a baby." _She laughed again.

Sean would never understand his sister's sense of humor. "Oh… wow, good luck…"

"_And to you too, you're the godfather by the way; I thought it would be nice to tell you that. So you'll have to get down here and stuff when the baby is born. Okay, see you!"_

And she hung up. No wonder Sean had pushed away the memory of the fact that he had a living relative in his mind.

When Sarah finally came home it was dark outside, the lampposts one by one were lit and Sean was sitting on their couch, reading 'War and Peace'.

"Hey Sarah," Sean said without looking up from his book.

"Sean…" He felt Sarah sit down beside him and he glanced at her, her expression was plain scared.

"What's the matter?" he asked her quickly and put down the book.

"I… I realized something… Sean I'm late…"

"For an appointment?" Sean tried, but he knew what was coming.

"I think we need to buy a pregnancy test."

----

"Does it really matter still?" Kaylee said desperately as Claire now, more energetic than ever was trying to help her walk. Her legs were shivering in pain but Claire refused to give up. "Now that rescue is so close can't you just forget it?"

"Absolutely not!" Claire said and frowned as Kaylee sat down. "Stand up!"

"I just want to discuss the fact that it might not matter now…" He voice trailed off as Claire stubbornly took her arm and they began once again. "We don't have to go there."

"I want answers Kay," Claire nodded to herself. "I need answers."

"We're risking our lives if we go into that jungle, can't you just move on! Whatever happened won't matter once we're off the island…"

"It will matter Kay. It will matter. I need peace."

Kaylee looked at Claire's troubled face. "Why do you need peace?"

"I have to know that they didn't do something to hurt Aaron when he was still in my belly."

Kaylee looked sympathetically at her friend. "Oh… right, okay."

"How's it going?" Sean grinned too brightly for it to be real. Kaylee guessed his mind was down on earth instead for up in the clouds like the rest of them of the news about the rescue, probably because of the fact that Flor was still missing. "Ready for a mission in the jungle?"

Claire smiled. "Kaylee's standing on her own!"

"No I'm not…" Kay looked around and saw that Claire wasn't holding her up. "I totally am!"

"Kaylee."

Kaylee frowned when she saw the serious look on Dom's face as he came up to them. "What's the matter?"

"We gotta talk, _now._"

--

"Lori!"

Lori halted as she heard Lalita's voice. "Yeah?"

"I need to speak with you." Lalita's tone was very serious.

"Go ahead."

Lori could feel how Lalita was tapping her foot in the sand, she inhaled deeply. "If we're going to get rescued… What will we do about the ones that have been taken?"

"Actually, rescue might take a long time to come."

"How so?" she asked quickly.

"For starters, the satellite phone we have to use to get in contact with the freighter is broken; I'm on my way to ask Sean to have a look at it. See if he can fix it."

"And if he can't?"

"Then I'll hit him, and we pray that the freighter will wonder what happened to Naomi and send more people after, or that chick Naomi was with will find us and hopefully her phone won't be broken. But… it will take time…"

"I'm going to speak with Andrea," Lalita said mostly to herself, and Lori knew with a twist in her stomach it was about the whole 'army' business.

--

"I still can't believe you're Bonnie McQueen! The famous actress!" Naomi grinned and laughed again, taking a piece of the 'Kim' fruit. "And you are Charlie Pace!" she shouted and waved at him.

Charlie came up to them, grinning just as much as Naomi. "Finally someone who recognizes my fame, yes that is me!"

"You both are really famous. And she over there… isn't that the Olwyn chick?"

Bonnie stopped herself from saying 'I know' at the famous part. "Yes."

"Your movies are selling like crazy, I think they're about to give you an Oscar and you Charlie, they made this Greatest Hits album!"

"Really?" Charlie asked, too surprised to be professional.

Naomi nodded. "You guys are really lucky we found you."

"Wendy is the luckiest," Charlie enlightened her. "That she discovered her pregnancy just in time to get rescued."

"She discovered WHAT?" Bonnie shrieked.

--

"He's one of them."

"So he's been lying," Locke looked thoughtfully at the door to the man's prison. "Interesting."

Jack was getting annoyed by how easily Locke seemed to accept it. "It's not interesting Locke."

"Oh yes it is," he said with a smile. "It is in fact fascinating."

"And why is that?"

"I find it very interesting that he, an other, would let himself be kidnapped so easily."

"It was so he could infiltrate us of course!" Jack snapped, tired of Locke's games.

"Why would they want to do that Jack? They could easily just come and kidnap us all if they wanted. It's interesting that he chose to do this…"

"It doesn't matter why, we know who he is and now we can deal with it."

"And how Jack?" Locke shouted after him as he opened the lock and pushed the door opened, facing the man sitting on the bed. His hands were closed like in a prayer. The man looked up for a moment, directly into Jack's eyes and then his eyes went down on the floor.

"The door isn't soundproof you know."

"Then you know we figured out who you are."

"Will you let me explain?" The man looked up again as Locke entered the room. "If you let me speak I will answer your questions – those questions I see fit to answer of course."

Locke gave him a nod. Jack crossed his arms and stared defiantly at the other.

"I came here to yes, infiltrate you, but not for the reasons you think!" he said exasperated. "I was going to earn your trust and then I was going to tell you the truth."

"The truth about what?" Jack asked him.

"We are not the enemy Jack – Locke, _they _are the enemy. The people coming on that freighter – they are not here to rescue you. I came here to warn you. So that maybe you could save yourselves and there wouldn't have to be a bloodbath."

Jack raised his eyebrows. "Bloodbath?"

"They will stop at nothing to get what they want! And you stand in their way."

"You know what I think?" Jack took one step closer to him. "I think that you, for some sick reason don't want us to leave. I think you're lying, and I do absolutely think you are the enemy!"

Jack closed his fist.

"Jack…" Locke said.

The man stared at it, surprised. Jack punched his fist in the man's jaw, his head flew back against the wall and Locke gave out a shout in protest. Blood dripped down the man's chin. He winced in pain.

"WHERE'S FLOR AND WALT? WHERE ARE THEY?" Jack screamed. "What have you done to them? TELL ME!"

"Jack, calm down!" Locke tried to get a grip of his shoulder but Jack shrugged him off and threw another punch at the man's nose, blood rushing down underneath his fist.

"Where are they?"

"Jack?"

It wasn't Locke, or the man. They both swung around as they heard steps in the corridor. With one quick look at the bleeding prisoner they locked the door behind them and Jack tried desperately to dry the blood off with a towel.

In came Allen and Ellie. Allen looked shocked at the bloody towel, but luckily enough Ellie was in too much awe over the hatch to notice.

"A real sink!" she exclaimed and looked happier than any girl in the world had been because of a sink.

Allen tried to act normal in front of his daughter, but Jack saw confusion in his eyes and his look became stern. "I heard there were records – board games?"

"Yes," Locke said quickly, he waved with a hand at the other room. "They're in there."

"Why don't you go in there and explore princess," Allen said with a forced smile. Ellie grinned widely and skipped off. Jack wasn't sure it was safe for the little girl… But he was still holding the bloody towel.

"Uh…" Jack was unsure of what to say.

"What in heaven's name is going on here?"

--

"How is getting rescued a problem?" Kaylee asked and crossed her arms.

"Well in case you've forgotten," Dom's face was red in anger, "we're bloody wanted Kay! The authorities will have us handcuffed the second we're off this island!"

"So what do you suggest we do? _Run?_" Kay spat. "Fake ID's, back to crappy motels and gambling each day for money?"

"Well that is if we manage to escape them in the first place!" Dom shouted a bit too loud. "We need a plan."

"A plan? Like what? _Threats?_ Try to convince the entire camp to lie about or names?"

Dom frowned at her. "I sense sarcasm."

"I…" Kay bit her lip, like she was trying hard not to say what was on her mind. "What do you expect of me Dom?"

"What the hell do you mean? Expect?"

"Yes, you're dragging me over here to discuss… well, this. Running. And… and I know the three of us are close, you Kate and I but… I don't want to be a part of this anymore."

"I repeat, what the hell do you mean?"

"I'm sorry. I'm not in. You are on your own." She turned around to go back, but Dom grabbed her shoulder and forced her around.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means I'm tired of running, if you want me to help you get out… then fine, I'll lie but for me… For me the running is over. When rescue comes and the authority comes, I will go with them, willingly. It's time to take my punishment, because now I deserve it."

"Is this about the 'oh my god' I killed the French chick crap? It was self-defense!"

"Just… stop… When you do whatever you're gonna do to get out, don't try to help me out okay? Just…" She took a few shivering steps back, and realized she wouldn't be able to get back to Claire on her own.

Dom sighed. "You are freaking difficult Evans." And he helped her go back without another word.

--

Sean turned the satellite phone upside-down. "I might be able to fix it."

"Our very own MacGyver," Lori said proudly to Naomi and patted Sean on the shoulder.

"But I don't have the resources here… maybe at the hatch…"

"The hatch?" Naomi looked confused.

"Long story," Lori said with a sigh.

"Everything around here is a long story, but should we go to this hatch then? Fix it up?" Naomi's smile was blinding, she was surprisingly okay with the whole fact that they weren't all dead at the bottom of the ocean but on an island instead.

"Yeah… sure."

"I'll just grab the water, Naomi come along!" Lori took Naomi by the shoulder and the two girls left for the kitchen, Lori talking very loudly. Sean was surprised at how well they got along.

In his hands he held the key to their rescue. He just needed to remind himself of that and stop thinking about unimportant matters, or less important. But somehow his mind slipped away to Flor.

Yes, even when she was gone she was still annoying and haunted his mind. He wondered what Lalita would do, would she go after her daughter? She had to if they were about to get rescued. He should talk to her about that…

"I think we might be able to head out today!" Claire's voice was positive and she smiled down at him.

Sean stood up, the phone still in his hands. "Head out?"

"Yes!" Claire's smile didn't go away but she looked a bit bewildered. "You know… the place where I was taken; you said you wanted to come!"

"Oh, yeah… right. I can't. Sorry. Gotta rescue you guys instead, ask Claret or someone."

"But… but…" Claire followed him as he walked towards Lori and Naomi. "Claret freaks out over every little thing!"

"I've heard she's an excellent tracker though. See you Claire." He tried to smile. But Claire looked so devastated he stopped trying.

"Ready to leave?" Lori asked him.

"Yeah…" Sean said and looked after Claire. "I'm ready."

----

Sean was tapping his feet at the floor and Sarah threw him a disgusted look. They were both sitting on far ends of the couch, tense and awaiting… the results.

"I'll stand by you, you know."

"I do know. You have said it a hundred times already." Sarah closed her hands together and nervously bit her lip.

"It's good… that you know…"

"No talking please?"

"Oh, okay."

They went silent and Sean continued to tap his foot, he couldn't help it, the seconds ticked away and he felt almost sweaty with stress.

"I will take care of you –"

"Sean, will you kindly shut up?"

"Just… if you are pregnant you have to stop smoking."

"I know."

Finally, the minutes ended and they both leaned forward to look at the results.

"Negative," Sean breathed.

Sarah inhaled shakily and Sean turned to her, put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, it's okay."

Sarah looked like she was at the edge of tears and she continued to breathe slowly, as to calm herself down. She put a hand over Sean's, and that little thing, was enough.

----

"What's your plan?"

Margo squinted against the sunlight. Wendy moved to her side and sat down on the makeshift bench. "What's your plan?" she repeated.

"Um… Zidler and I were going to go and do pranks on Andrea…" Margo gave her an apprehensive look.

"I mean about the whole pregnancy deal, with me pretending to be knocked up for your sake!"

"Yeah… we should totally discuss it," Margo said and looked like she never wanted it to be mentioned again. "But you see, we have this awesome prank involving Kim's surfboard and –"

"Margo!" Wendy said in a voice that her mother always used when she had done something bad. "Do you realize, that the entire camp thinks that I'm pregnant?"

"Yes, that was the whole point with you pretending to be _pregnant!_"

"I don't want to do this anymore. Why do I have to lie when we're about to get rescued? Nothing of that matters anymore…"

"Please, Wendy, can't you just lie a little longer…?"

"Do you realize that Rosalie just talked to me about the 'joy' of motherhood and that I had to endure Lori's rant for _two hours_ about how awfully painful it would be to give birth?"

Margo looked scared. "It won't be that awfully painful will it? I've seen a few movies and –"

"More than a day in anguishing pain."

Margo's eyes widened and Wendy almost fell sorry for her. Almost. She still remembered the very awkward conversation she'd had with Ellie about how she had gotten a baby in her belly.

"Anyway, Margo, I am doing this just because I'm your friend. But I have to understand why you can't just tell anyone the truth. I know you're scared –"

"I'm more than scared Wendy!" Margo's eyes were wide. "I'm terrified okay? My life is slipping through my fingers and… I just can't deal with all this right now."

"But why do you want me to lie?"

Margo opened and closed her mouth like a fish. Wendy looked encouraging at her. "Zidler!" Margo shouted a little too loud.

"Is it because of Zidler?"

"Is it what because of me… what?" Wendy turned around and saw Zidler holding Kim's surfboard, grinning at them. "Are you ready Margo?" His smile faded when he saw the murdering look Wendy was sending him. "Um… hi, Wendy…"

And in that moment she realized it. She could slap herself on the face for not getting it sooner. She had known… just not really thought about it.

"Oh right!" she said and patted Margo's back a little too hard. She then turned to Zidler. "I'm pregnant, yippee!" she said without any joy. Threw one last threatening look at Margo before she left to hide from Bonnie, Charlie had been nice and warned her.

"Oh, hi Rosalie."

Rosalie stood in front of her in the sand, hands on her hips and with an amused look on her face. Blocking her path.

"Can you move?" Wendy tried to go around her but Rosalie still tried to block her path. "I have to escape from Bonnie!"

Rosalie smiled sympathetically. "Too late."

Wendy spun around. "Um… hi Bonnie…"

All that was missing from the furious appearance of Bonnie was the smoke coming out from her ears.

--

Ana-Lucia and Andrea were both hanging laundry, something so simple and normal that they fumbled with the clothes, dropped them and completely hung them wrong. Ana growled in irritation when she tried to straighten a shirt out.

"People are still scared. The interest was high after the fire but now when rescue is coming close no one's especially interested."

"But you think it's still necessary?" Andrea asked her and helped her with the difficult shirt.

"Of course it's still necessary. I have a feeling the others aren't going to let us go easily."

"Well, there's no army without any people in it." Andrea sighed. "I agree with you, I think the same, but Jack's not pushing for it either and he's the one who started the idea. Everyone just wants to leave, expect to leave."

Ana and Andrea finally managed to get the shirt up on the line. "We should just go to the hatch," Ana complained silently and with a higher voice she said, "I'm not leaving."

"Why?"

"I'm not leaving until we've rescued the kidnapped people, the kids, Zack, Eva and Emma."

They didn't get along, they should at least not. Their temperament and personalities didn't fit. But they did have the whole overprotecting of children thing in common, and the army. But they were not going to admit that they might, just kind of like the other person.

"Let's just wait and see if the satellite phone works all right?" Andrea had a strange feeling that Ana might go into the jungle alone on a rescue party, and that would be insane. It was suicide out there.

--

"Lalita, it's suicide!" Rosalie yelled and got embarrassed when she saw several heads turn their way. She took Lalita by the arm and pulled her closer to the jungle where they could speak in private.

"It's definitely not suicide. And it's not like I'm going in there alone, I'm just going to explore."

"That's right. You won't be alone. I'm coming with you." Rosalie put on that stubborn look that Lalita both loved and hated sometimes.

"I meant that if I find the other's base, I won't go and rescue Eva on my own. Listen to me love, I will just try to find it, and I have to find it. Now that's rescue is coming, I must get Eva back."

Rosalie's expression melted at first at her wife's words, but then she was determined again. "Then why can't I come?"

"Because it's not safe –" Lalita just realized what she'd said. "Um…"

"Now you said it yourself! See, it's not okay, it's not safe to go out there –"

"It's not safe for you. But it's safe for me. Rosie, if I'm going to try to find her. I can't have you close to me. Because I love you both so much, but I won't be able to protect you both." She took Rosalie's hand. "Please, just trust me. I know what I'm doing. I can find them, I can find her."

Rosalie's eyes were sad, but there were no tears. "I don't want to lose you again."

Lalita took her other hand and kissed her lips first softly, but then deeper in goodbye. As the kiss ended, Lalita rested her forehead against hers. Whispered, "I love you. Can you please lie for me?"

Rosalie didn't want to let her go and her pulled her hands out from her grip and pulled them around her in an embrace instead. "Yes."

--

"HELLO! Attention please!"

"Hey, we eat there!" Charlie protested at first, but then his eyes widened in realization and he was intrigued.

A group started to form around the dining table, which Brian now stood on top of. Waving his arms around trying to make everyone come closer.

"Is he going to tell the truth about Boone?" Zidler said to no one in particular.

"Everyone! Good, right…" Brian looked around at all the survivor's, saw the anticipation.

He cleared his throat. "Does anyone know Latin?"'

"What?" several survivors shouted at once. Everyone gaped at him confused.

And long back in the crowd of people, Fox raised a shivering hand.

--

"An infiltrator? How come you didn't tell us about this!"

Jack was used to see Allen as a very calm person. Rational. A sense of logic in the chaos of the camp. He'd not really seen him so… angry. Not that he was very mad, if you compared him to people like Lori and Owen he was actually quite peaceful. But now he was glaring at both of them while trying to keep his voice low so his daughter wouldn't overhear.

"We didn't want to upset everyone." The argument sounded weak in Jack's ears even though it was he who uttered it.

"Everyone will be more than upset now when they find out about this."

"Yes, we know."

Allen sighed a sigh that Jack had many times heard from his father, the sigh of disappointment. "So what are you going to do now?"

"We are working on that," said Locke and glanced at the door to the prisoner. The alarm started and he walked with help of his crutches out to the computer room, leaving Jack and Allen alone.

Before they could pick up the conversation again though Ellie skipped in with wide eyes. "What's that alarm Daddy?" she whined and with a board game in her hands. "It's scary. I don't like it. Make it stop."

The alarm silenced. Ellie grinned widely. "You see that Jackie? Daddy knows magic, just like Uncle Zidler!"

Jack wondered if it was Sawyer or Lori who taught her that nickname. Locke returned and saw Ellie open the game and start to pick out the pieces.

"That's chess," he told her and smiled. "I know how to play it."

"Can you teach me?"

"Of course." Locke gave Jack a look. "We can play in the other room so your father and Jack can talk."

Allen watched after them as they left, when they were gone he turned to Jack again. "What are you planning to do with him?"

"I'm thinking we should trade him for Walt, Boone and Florence – and maybe Michael too. He's been gone so long I think they've gotten him. At least hopefully get one of them."

"That sounds like a good idea, when are you going to do it?"

"Gonna do what?" As always, Lori smiled, she heard way too well.

"Are we interrupting something?" While many of them had been in astonishment at seeing the hatch for the first time, Naomi just seemed vaguely interested. Like she'd seen more strange things on islands before.

"Are you gonna tell them?"

"Tell us what?" Sean held the satellite phone in his hand and watched Jack with confusion.

----

Sean closed the door to their apartment. The lights were turned off and he guessed Sarah wasn't home yet. He took off his shoes and frowned when he saw one of her boots loosely thrown in the middle of the floor. He put it back into place and that was when he heard it. It sounded like a sniff and he followed the sound to their bedroom.

There, on the bed Sarah sat with her back to him.

"Are you crying?" Sean quickly hurried to her side. "What's the matter? You can tell me."

Sarah sniveled, tears streaming down her face and she stopped trying to dry them away and leaned onto Sean. He wrapped an arm around her as she sobbed. "It's… it's Elizabeth."

A thousand thoughts crossed Sean's mind, the way Sarah was crying, it could only mean…

"She's… she's dead…"

There was not really a body, they buried an empty casket. The flames had turned her into ash. There were not many people there. Apparently Elizabeth didn't have any parents alive, as the only ones there were her friends, or friends of Sarah, him and another guy, who was standing far away like he was afraid to come close.

After the ceremony Sarah was comforted by her friends and Sean didn't really know what to do, he glanced at the man and decided the least he could do was talk to him. Maybe he was her family.

"Hello," Sean said awkwardly to the man. His hair was dark brown and he had sharp grey eyes that stared at him curiously. "Were you related to her?"

The man gave a hoarse laugh and his gaze left him and went to the grave. "No, I was most definitely not."

"A friend then?"

"Acquaintances." The man's smile didn't reach his eyes. "Since Ellie here doesn't have any family I assume you were her friend."

"Elizabeth was more like a friend of a friend," Sean admitted.

"Oh, that's Ellie right." The man's tone was harsh and he looked at Sean again. "I'm Simon Bailey."

Sean gazed over at Sarah who was now walking towards them. "Sean O'Donnell," he introduced himself.

He missed the surprised expression form in Simon's face as Sarah reached them, her eyes red of crying. "Can we leave now, please?"

"Sure." He put an arm around her and glanced at Simon one last time, "see you around some time yeah?"

"Oh you will," Simon muttered darkly.

----

Brian watched Fox as he nervously spread out the papers to take a look at them. "Where did you learn Latin?"

"B-books and stuff…"

"Weird, anyway," he said and threw down a book in front of him, "that's the journal."

Fox picked it up and his eyes widened with every page he turned. Brian watched as anxiety and excitement passed his face all at once, something in his eyes – wonder.

"You know what it says?" Brian leaned closer and looked at the letters even though he didn't understand them.

"Well… it-it's not easy. But I under-understand some things." Fox continued to turn the pages, eyes tracing the lines of words.

"So… translate for me?" Brian frowned at him.

Fox looked at him. "Where d-did you get it?"

"I found it," Brian said quickly, "well, Boone and Locke found it actually, but where it comes from doesn't matter, can you just tell me what it –"

"No." Fox shut the journal closed and Brian blinked in surprise. "Not before you tell me where you g-got it."

Brian sighed in annoyance. Fox wasn't much of a threat, not much of a gossiper either. He was just curious. "Locke and Boone found it in the jungle, on a ship okay?"

"A _ship?_"

"Like a boat but bigger, and yes it was in the jungle and no, I am not lying." Brian opened the journal again. "Can you please translate?"

"Oh – okay, that e-explains it." Fox scanned through the first page. "It's a log-logbook. And uh…" He turned a few pages, "the captain of this sh-ship wrote in-in this."

"What did he write?"

Fox's excitement had turned to confusion and stress. "It-it doesn't make sense. The beginning is a normal logbook, stat-statistics, about the ship and then…" He flipped to a page and showed it to Brian. "Then there's t-this."

Brian looked at the drawing, the equations, the words were still in Latin but they were different. "It's a different handwriting."

Fox nodded eagerly. "And a complete diff-different sort of Latin. Newer."

"So," Brian wanted to see if he got it right, "there are two people who've written in this journal?"

"Yes."

"Which leads back to the beginning, translate what they are writing about."

Fox opened his mouth but closed it immediately as a very pretty Japanese girl came over to them and sat down next to him. "I didn't know you knew Latin!" She beamed. "That's really cool, so what are you translating?"

Brian did the universal glare of 'get out of here' at her, but Kim just smiled. "I heard it was you who took my surfing board by the way."

Brian was about to say something very rude, but Fox (while looking like a flickering stoplight, going from red to pale all the sudden) interfered before he could say anything. "We're translating t-this journal Bri-Brian found in a ship in-in the jungle."

Brian stared at Fox, he had no words for how utterly idiotic that boy was. "So Kim," he said still staring at Fox, "would you mind fetching the surfing board for me so I can _slam it over Fox's stupid head!_"

Kim and Fox blinked in unison.

"Hide this for me will ya?"

All three of them looked up at Sawyer, holding a bottle of wine in his hand, looking over his shoulder every other second.

"What…"

"Just hide it!" Sawyer spat and dumped it behind the improvised table.

"Why?" Kim asked him, gazing up at him.

Sawyer looked over his shoulder and then at Kim. His eyes widened, like he just realized something, and then his lips curled up in his usual smirk. "For you of course, _Amethyst._"

Kim gaped. "How…"

"Sawyer!"

The scream sounded familiar, but before they could ask Sawyer who it was he was already gone.

"That… was… weird," Brian finally said.

Kim nodded a bit stunned. "I think that was that Owen girl who screamed."

"Oh, well, that explains everything."

--

After Sean was done yelling at Jack about 'trust' and 'loyalty' and other things that was not suitable near four-year old children in the next room he sat down on a chair and asked in a hoarse voice after water.

Naomi filled up a glass and gave it to him, while staring at the door to the imprisoned man.

"Nice story," Lori said after a long time of silence, "gotta go and tell the entire camp about it." She completely ignored Jack and walked out of the room, her angry steps fading.

"I guess you didn't know about the natives…" Jack said, directed to Naomi.

"Actually I told you before, that's the reason I have a gun, there are always chances there are dangers, and especially when you get a mission like I did. Rescue a bunch of people that are supposedly dead, this is the least of shocks for me."

"This is your problem," Sean said and shook his head, "we're just here to try to fix the phone. And before you try to trade him or whatever, get some damn information from him."

He stood up and Naomi followed after him to get the toolbox.

"That went well," Allen said tiredly, "now you get a taste of how the entire camp will react. And he's right – information, we need information."

"Well the last time we tried to get information, the interrogator ended up torturing the suspect and runoff into the jungle," Locke limped into the room on his crutches. "Ellie says she wants to go back to the beach."

Allen nodded and went to get his daughter, Jack met Locke's gaze.

"I suggest you go to the beach, try to calm everyone down. I can stay here."

--

Wendy growled with irritation.

"Wow, you sound like a mad dog." Claret smiled but the smile faded as Wendy scowled at her. "You really are angry, what's the matter?"

All of Wendy's instincts told her to scream and rage, but Claret was just so nice, and Wendy knew she would listen. "It's the whole pregnancy thing; everyone is making such a big deal about it."

Claret sat down beside the girl and leaned back against the tree. "Everyone thinks it's a big deal Wendy, a pregnant woman, when we're stranded here and with the fact that…" She bit her lip like she didn't want to say it. "That Karl is the… you know _father._"

Wendy snapped her neck around to look at Claret so fast it hurt. "What?"

"Margo told me."

Okay, Wendy didn't care that Margo was all crushing on Zidler she couldn't go around telling people things! Oh god, she was never gonna tell the truth was she? What if she wanted to make like a false belly and all – no, before it would come to that Wendy would already have told the whole camp about it. She was _not_ going to wear a false pregnancy belly.

"Why," Wendy said through gritted teeth, "would Karl be the father?"

"Because Margo said you said so and because… you got this connection and you let him go after we took him and then gave him food in the jungle –"

Wendy's eyes widened. "You knew about that?"

"Yes," Claret smiled again, "you weren't very subtle about your feelings, both of you."

"Guys!" It was Zidler, he had a weird look on his face as his eyes met Wendy's and then he turned his gaze to Claret. "Lori's making some kind of announcement, c'mon!"

--

"And now we really don't need to go on a mission –" Kay started to say, but Claire, with new mother superpowers (because how else could you explain where she got all that stubbornness and strength all of a sudden?) shut her up by tugging her arm until she was standing again.

"I'm not a doll!" Kay told her. "And now when there's this guy at the hatch, he might have all the answers, and I don't think it matters –"

"We've been over this a million of times Kaylee, and you said you were coming with me so you are." Claire tried to look innocent and pouted.

"Okay, okay, but are you sure?"

"Yeah, and Sean's not coming with us anymore so… after the revelation of the infiltrator person I asked Claret to come with us, she looked a bit sad."

"That's… good."

--

Jack could've caught up to Lori easily, but he knew she needed some time to be angry at him, and he wasn't really in the mood of getting punched in the face so he walked back to the camp with a slower pace and tried to clear his thoughts.

It should be easier to think now, when he was alone strolling between the trees than when he was always in the presence of other people, wanting help with wounds or freighter guys or the newest problem they had come across, but now he couldn't focus on that either. His mind just went back to think about Lori.

And then someone whispered something in his ear. He spun around but all he saw was the trees, there was no one there. A small whisper. He swung around again, stumbled forward.

"Hello?" he shouted, turning his head around to each side. "Hello?" Small fragments of words he could catch, like the words months, die, care.

_Are you okay?_

_Sarah I didn't mean to…_

_It'll come back around little flower. _

Jack stopped in his tracks, frowning as the whispers grew closer, louder. "Who…"

"Jack."

Jack spun around again; he stared with wide eyes at the grim man standing, half hidden behind the vines. "_Dad?_"

His father's mouth was closed in a thin line, he looked directly at Jack but there was no recognition. He turned slowly around and walked away, disappearing into the trees.

"Dad!" Jack didn't know what he was thinking. His father was dead. But there was no rational thought as he darted through the jungle, trying to catch a glimpse of the man. The trees cleared and he was running on stone – and then he wasn't running at all, but he was _falling._

He grabbed aimlessly but managed to get a hold of some roots, and he was dangling at the side of the cliff. Panting and desperately forcing himself not to look down as he tried to hoist himself up.

"Help," he said in a hoarse voice, but it was useless. The sun blinded him and his arms were already tired. He gritted his teeth and tried to gather some strength but there was none. "Help…"

Dirt fell in his face and he spit it out as a hand reached down to him. He grabbed it without hesitation and was pulled up; he panted heavily on the solid ground and just laid there without moving. Finally, he glanced to his side.

"Thank you." For saving my life felt as a stupid thing to say, but that was what Dom had done.

"A real cliff-hanger there." Dom's expression was grave. Jack sat up and wondered tiredly if Dom had some water with him.

"Do you –"

"You owe me one." Dom cut him off and glared at him. "I got you up from that cliff but I could just as well throw you back in."

Jack blinked and realized that Dom wasn't stressed from rescuing him, but actually furious – at him, for some reason. He was still dizzy from hanging from a freaking cliff. "What…"

"You have been threatening my sister." His green eyes were cold.

"I…"

"You found the mug shot, you saw it, you know she was a fugitive – and you're smart enough to put two and two together and realize I was with her too. So what do you want Jack? Are you gonna tell everyone about us? You have been quiet this far… Or are you now with rescue coming close gonna wait and drop the bomb to the authorities?" Dom paused, and Jack wondered what he expected him to say – but it wasn't needed, Dom started to speak again, "Well, that's not going to happen. I saved your life, so you owe me one, so now you owe it to me to forget everything about Kate."

Jack was too tired to fight it, as Dom stood up he stood up on his legs too. "Okay."

Dom nodded. "Now we are going to be rescued. And me and Kate will get rescued too, are you gonna be a problem about that?"

Jack avoided his gaze and stared at the jungle instead. "No."

--

"I just want to wait until Dom comes back," Kaylee said to Claire. "He would kill me if I left without saying goodbye."

She was standing on her own, and it didn't hurt, and it wasn't tiring, she knew it would get worse though – a trek in the jungle wasn't easy. But Claire actually didn't seem to care that she would slow them down, and they had Claret.

"I'm going to ask Wendy if she can take care of Aaron," Claire said with a smile and took up her son in her arms. "Since she's now gonna be a mother and all."

Kay glanced at the jungle and then back at Claire. "Did you hear the rumor about her and Karl?"

"Yes I did." Claire's smile faded. "Can you see if Claret's done with her packing?"

Kay nodded and walked through the tents and shelters over to Claret's, she jokingly knocked on the tree by it. Claret looked up from her backpack. "Hey Kay, I'm soon done."

"Good," Kaylee smiled and then frowned. "Is that all you're taking with you?"

"Yeah… one backpack is more than enough; it will be heavy to carry more weight in the heat.

"I so need to redo my packing," Kay said and Claret grinned. "Can you meet me and Claire by the tree line in about five minutes?"

"Sure," Claret answered.

The three women said goodbye to the camp, promised that they weren't going to attack the others on their own to Andrea and Ana. Claire kissed her son's temple and smiled at Wendy, far away Margo stood, staring at them with a frightened expression.

Claret waved as they wandered into the jungle, she bit her lip at the thought of the man in the hatch. It couldn't be him. If it was him he would've let her know. So she just walked, and hoped that everything was going to be okay.

--

"I would like to meet your prisoner guy."

"Yeah, sure," Sean said without any interest as he took off another piece of the satellite phone.

"It looks more like you're taking it apart that fixing it," Locke said to Sean and then he turned to Naomi, "I don't think it's safe for anyone to see him at the moment."

Naomi closed her lips in a thin line and she looked mad for some reason. Sean looked away and back to the phone he was working on. "Sometimes you gotta take away the pieces and see what makes it tick." He smiled.

"John!"

Sean almost dropped the phone as the guy started screaming behind the door. "John!"

"That's the prisoner right?"

"Yes," Locke said with a finger on his jaw, "yes it is."

"Shouldn't you go talk to him?" Naomi asked quickly as the man continued to shout.

"I will," Locke said calmly and watched the phone.

----

The princess was now a queen. Instead of soft pink lips she had furious red ones, dark lashes hovering above her blue eyes and dark clothes. It was like she was trying too hard to be mature, an adult, as if she wanted to prove to someone that she could take care of herself. It was two years ago he had last seen her, and he hadn't recognized her at first. And what had stricken him the most was not the apparent change of style, from girly pink to this, but it was the dark look in her eyes, more serious than he'd ever seen her before.

Sean was sitting in a coffee shop, usually he and his friend Tony would go down to the pub to eat and drink, but it was just drinking that had gotten them thrown out in the first place. And of course there were other pubs, but they were too lazy to search around Sydney for one just as good. Laziness was good Tony said, and Sean agreed. They'd worked so much and they deserved a holiday.

Tony had gone to the bathroom; he wasn't back yet, hangover still. Sean was more used to it and didn't even squint at the light. He turned his head to look out of the window, at the gloomy street and the small rain pouring down. And that was when he saw her again, after a very long time… Two years was it now?

She walked up to him immediately just as she came in, sat down without an invitation in Tony's seat and leaned back to stare at him. "Hello Sean."

"Long time no see, princess." It felt stupid to use the old nickname. It didn't fit here. He found himself looking around the room searching after Sarah, hoping she was with her.

"She's not here," Elizabeth said like she knew what he had been thinking. A smile played on her lips. "She's still not that into you."

And that was when Sean snapped out of it and looked at her, really looked at her. This was Elizabeth, but still not, people changed of course but this was just ridiculous. The way she was sitting, the way she smiled and the way she talked it was all wrong.

He cleared his throat. "So what are you doing here in Sydney? Funny coincidence we would meet just here, I was on a holiday with –"

Elizabeth leaned forward and took Tony's untouched coffee and sipped from it. "Shut it Sean. I'm not interested in that. And you can shut your mouth too, you look like a fish."

"You…" You just don't sit down in front of a person you haven't seen in two years and act like this! he wanted to shout.

"Sarah's here, in Sydney."

"She… she is?" And now Sean felt stupid. The way Elizabeth was acting didn't matter if Sarah was here. Who cared about Elizabeth?

"Yes she is." Elizabeth took another sip from the coffee. "She's here to get married."

Sean felt all blood drain from his face. He considered walking up to the nearest roof and with a piece of metal and wait for the lightning to hit him. No, hanging himself in the hotel room was faster.

"I suggest you get over her, it's been two years. She's tired of you calling, leaving messages, she's tired of you trying to live in the past." Elizabeth stood up. "You should leave Sydney, there's no reason to lie to yourself."

She walked right out into the rain, a fitting mood to what Sean was feeling. His hands were shivering and he tried to keep them steady. Gritted his teeth and held back all the pain and just make the damn hands steady!

"What did I miss?" Tony chirped and sat down in his seat.

"I saw Elizabeth."

Tony raised his eyebrows. "Allens?"

"Yes."

"But… Ellie's dead. You were at her funeral. She burned up… "

"Exactly. I need a drink."

----

She looked at him again and his face was grim. "Whatever it takes," he reminded her – just like he had done their whole trip.

"Whatever it takes," she answered with a small whisper. Her bones were weary and her clothes felt uncomfortable her skin, the sand sticking to her legs and feet. They were both thirsty and she gazed at the sea wishfully, even though she knew she couldn't drink from it.

"We're here."

She could see it for herself. The shelters and the people. Different. A lot had changed since she'd last been there. The Labrador between them barked loudly at the sight of the survivors.

"Whatever it takes." They glanced at each other one last time, yet they didn't know how much those words would come to mean.

A little girl noticed them first, and her eyes widened as she recognized Michael. She stood up from the chess set she had been playing with on the ground and shouted, but whatever words that came from her mouth she didn't listen to.

The dog ran away from them. Frightening the little girl and barking.

She didn't feel it. That feeling she had expected to feel once she was back again. She just felt so damn tired, tired of this. She wanted it to be done with. She just wanted to get off the island and never look back.

Someone pulled her into a hug but she was too exhausted to respond, just limp in the woman's arms.

_And honey, smile._

A few words that she had repeated to herself over and over again, so she smiled and let herself get pulled into another hug. And then another one, and another one. She smiled broader, asked for water and when it reached her lips it felt like the first time. It was clearer and it gave her some strength. Voices asked if she was hurt, she didn't know, maybe she was. She pulled away from their embraces and looked over the crowd, unknown faces. Different.

Someone ran towards her. His hair was lighter because from the sun and she squinted, tried to see better. Words came, more worried voices. She just wanted to run too, greet him just like all those dreams she'd been having. She wanted to do that so bad.

But when he reached her she was on her knees, and her arms were too weak to hug and her lips too dry to speak, all she could do was to let him take her up in his arms.

"Jack!" Sean shouted. Desperate. Maybe happy too. "Someone get Jack! Flor – Flor are you okay? Where are you hurt? _Flor._"

And hell, that was just the beginning.

--

**Author's Notes:** I love you guys.

I am really sick. I haven't talked for days (and I love talking!) I haven't been able to help clean the house for Christmas, cook or anything! Not that I can cook… but it's the thought that counts. It sucks. I really hope I'll be fine for Christmas Eve… but… I don't know. I hope you all have a wonderful holiday yourself and enjoy it the fullest!

So all mistakes… blame the sickness! *hint*

The deleted scenes will be posted on Christmas day. I hope.

For the next chapter, I recommend (demand) that you listen to the lost season one soundtrack, preferably Life & Death and Parting Words.

Namaste.

(And if you think Sean's flashbacks are confusing – just wait until the next Sean flashback).


	24. Christmas Special

**Notes from me: This Christmas special contains very special flashbacks of some of your characters' earlier Christmases. Scenes that I decided to take out from the chapters and a special look on Andrea's past. **

**--**

**Christmas Flashbacks**

**--**

"_Christmas Day would have been the perfect day to get married Flor! Seriously, put me as your wedding planner –"_

"I told you Allison." Florence smiled and put the present underneath the tree, in her other hand she held the phone pressed to her ear. "We're taking things slow, we don't want to rush."

"_You've been engaged for over a year! The kid is already born so what are you bloody waiting for?"_

"We're…" Flor bit her lip and frowned. "We're… "

"_Taking things slow."_

Florence almost tripped over another Christmas present. "We are in love; we're just waiting for the right time… when Jeremy's older."

"_Sure, sure." _

"I'm going to bed, goodbye."

"_This early? Flor you've gotten –"_

Flor shut the phone with a sigh. She stepped away from the Christmas tree. In the plastic branches colorful Christmas tree balls hung, red, purple and even a pink one. She smiled at the sight of it.

From the bedroom, she heard her son start to whine. She knew he wouldn't remember this Christmas when he was older, but she was going to, and she was going to make it a very special one.

--

"And Zidler, darling, remember to stay at least five feet away from the candles please, and hello Richard!" his mother shouted and pushed him away to hug his uncle.

Zidler smiled sheepishly and took in the surroundings of his old home. A Christmas tree stood in the corner of the living room, red and green balls hung in it. At the top there was a silver star. "Dad?" he asked and moved closer to the man standing beside the tree, looking frightened at the arrival of the new guests.

"Montgomery," he simply said, "I assume the car didn't break down or anything since you're here." He looked up at the roof and mouthed something that could've been 'damn you'.

"Why are there… weird hats everywhere? And why's mom speaking so weird?"

"Your mother thinks she's English."

"Oh that explains it then."

"Monty!" A little girl squealed and jumped to hug him. Zidler's father scoffed as Zidler tripped and fell.

Zidler stood up, looked around and luckily no one had seen it, or they was so used to him doing crazy stuff they'd stopped paying notice. "Hey Elsie," he said and hugged his little sister.

"I'm so glad you're here!" Elsie's eyes were big. "Hazel's scary, she's no fun anymore. All she does is snorting and raising her eyebrows. Is Charlotte here too?"

"I think so. I drove her here, but she disappeared into the crowd."

"Oh, oh!" Elise clapped her hands together, and if possible, her eyes became even bigger. "Make something disappear."

Zidler turned around and looked at their father.

"Never," he said and quickly escaped into the kitchen.

"Mum's being a pain in the – Oh hey Elsie." Charlotte smiled at the little girl and then turned to Zidler. "Have you put anything on fire?"

"Not yet," Zidler said, "but we've only been here for five minutes."

Charlotte laughed and threw her blonde hair back.

"Mom's English!" Elsie yelled to get her older brother's attention.

--

"Grandpa…" The little girl whispered in a shivering voice.

"Yes Clairy?"

Claret took a step back from the window and looked at her grandfather with big eyes. "There's someone big, red and beardy outside!"

"That's Santa sweetheart." Her grandpa smiled lovingly at her from the doorway in the kitchen.

"What… what's that Santa gonna do?" Claret took a few shaking steps back and knocked over a chair.

"Clairy, you know what Santa does, he brings presents. Why don't you go and open the door for him?"

"Santa – he's bad." Claret shook her head. "Mom told me grandpa; he's a spy in disguise."

The smile fell from his face and he sighed deeply. "Clairy… This Santa will not harm you, I promise."

A tear ran down her cheek and she sniveled. "Mom said it would."

He pulled her into a hug and the little girl cried against his shoulder. "Santa is a nice person, he brings gifts to children who have been nice, sometimes he goes down the chimney and leaves them under the tree, and other times he knocks at the front door to give them to the children personally, he doesn't do any harm."

Her grandfather still went outside, took the pack with presents and watched as the Santa left. Just to make sure Claret stood by the window, as another tear fell down her face. She wished her mom was with her.

--

Bonnie bit her lip and finally managed to get the candle to burn. Her mother clapped her hands together and her father smiled and kissed her on the cheek.

As the night came, Bonnie smudged her lipstick on the cover but she was content. It'd been a good day, a brilliant Christmas day. Even though she was only twelve (she hated when people said that, but she knew it was true) she really appreciated being with her family. And she also loved the feeling of her whole life, no, the whole world being in front of her. On days like this it felt like she could do anything, be anything!

She sat violently up in her bed as she heard a scream. Her eyes flickered over the dark room and she quickly went out of the bed. "Dad?"

She took a few careful steps towards the door. "Dad?"

Bonnie opened it and the sight that met her was yellow, red and orange. Flames licked the floor and the walls were ablaze. The heat hit her face and she screamed and screamed.

"DAD! MOM!" She couldn't move. It was like her feet were glued to the floor. She saw the flames get closer. Her head felt dizzy and she knew it was because of the smoke. But she couldn't close her eyes or her mouth either. "MOM!"

A photograph fell from the wall and glass shattered around her feet. She screamed as the blood ran down her feet.

"BONNIE!" Her father ran towards her. It looked like he was running on fire. Were his feet burning? His hands were red. He took her up in his arms.

"MOM!" Bonnie screamed and wriggled in his grip. "MOM!"

Her father put a hand over her eyes and she couldn't see anymore. But still the whole world was swaying in her head and her hands were burning, just like the fire. Red. Yellow. Orange… and _blue. _Was she crying? Her cheeks burned.

She suddenly felt cold as he put her down on the ground. She blinked and looked at her father's sooty face.

"I'll be back, just stay here honey." He disappeared from her view and all she could do was to stay still. Couldn't move. Couldn't breathe.

Black smoke reached out to her, crawled over here and crept into her eyes.

All because of a little candle.

--

Lori giggled. "What is that?"

"That little sister, is called a dress."

Lorraine frowned and let the garment slide between her fingers, it felt nice, soft. But she didn't like dresses at all. "What color is it?"

"A neon green."

Lori hit her brother on the arm but smiled. "No, what is it?"

"What do you think it is?"

Lori bit her lip. She put the dress down on the floor and let her finger follow it. "I… I think it's blue."

"It is!" Desmond hugged her and she could hear him laugh. "Merry Christmas!"

--

"Happy one year anniversary."

Rosalie mumbled something and pulled the pillow over her head. Lalita laughed. "It's Christmas Rosie wake up!"

"Christmas?"Rosalie mumbled, "Christmas is tomorrow, sleep is now."

Lalita sat up and with a raised eyebrow looked down at her wife. A shout was heard from the door and she waved at the little girl to come in.

"Mama!"

"Not now, sleep." Rosalie tried to keep the pillow over her head, but Eva was more determined and threw it away.

"It's Christmas mama!"

Rosalie finally rolled around so she was facing Lalita and blinked. "Christmas?"

Lita laughed again. "Yes, Christmas."

--

"Everyone's so boring. They're doting over little Celia like she's the most precious thing in the world." Linda sighed and looked up at the roof. "And she really is _not._"

Wendy rolled her eyes, but didn't protest. Linda was her friend and she let her complain, just like she would let Wendy rage when she was angry. But today was different, it was Christmas.

Wendy liked Christmas, of course it was mostly just her and her mom, but she liked that. To have her mother all to herself, get all the presents and talk Spanish to each other while drinking hot chocolate.

This year, her mother wasn't celebrating Christmas with her, Wendy wasn't sure where she was – but it meant Wendy had to be with Linda's family.

"C'mon!" Wendy said and jumped up from the bed. "Let's go and see if we can open the presents yet."

"We _can't,_" Linda moaned but she also stood up. "Not until after six, but okay we can try."

As soon as they left her room Wendy could hear the loud Christmas music again, the drunken laughs and the smell of candy and roast turkey. She and Linda rushed down the stairs, Linda far more gracefully than Wendy.

"Mom!" Linda tried to get the attention from the very tall woman with dark red lipstick. "Mom!"

"Ah, yes sweetheart?"

"Can we open the gifts yet? _Please?_"

"Um, sure, sure," she said. Linda absolutely beamed at Wendy, but Wendy was unsure.

"Come on then! She said we could open them!" Linda took Wendy by the arm and dragged her between the adults to the Christmas tree.

As soon as they both sat down with wide eyes looking at all the presents, Linda's older sister Jasmine stomped over to them. "What are you doing?"

"We're opening our gifts of course." Linda took a big box wrapped in yellow paper.

"Who said you were allowed to?" Jasmine stole the gift from her.

"Mom said so! Give it back!"

"It's tradition that we do it at six!" Jasmine spat.

"You're boring! Hand it to me!"

"No!"

"You're so lucky you don't have any siblings," Linda told Wendy before she attacked her sister.

--

"So this is little Ellie then?" Allen's older brother Sam said with a smile.

"Yes."

"She got your eyes! Hey Allen." His brother's girlfriend Sasha closed the door behind them. "I hope you had a pleasant trip."

"Bad." Ellie wrinkled her nose. "Planes bad."

Sam patted Ellie on the head. "Well, you are here now. Good to see you again bro."

"We're thinking picnic in the garden," said Sasha as Allen helped Ellie take off her shoes, "it's such a lovely weather isn't it?"

With a grumble, Allen helped his daughter take her shoes on again.

It was bright and warm outside. Sasha laid out a red blanket they could all sit on. Ellie had already fallen in love with Australia, the heat, the sea and the different way everyone spoke. She had decided she wanted to stay there forever and Sasha brought her to show her some toys she had.

"For someone so little, she does look a lot like her mother." Sam sighed and squinted at the light.

"Yes." Allen simply agreed.

"She's full of life."

"Yes," Allen said again. Yes was about the only word he'd said since he got there. He loved his brother, they were family, but somehow they just couldn't speak to each other.

But it was okay, Allen thought as Sasha and Ellie returned and she laughed and smiled. Words were just words after all.

--

**Deleted Scenes**

**Notes: In the beginning, when I decided to delete a passage I just did that, I erased it, but later I started to save some of them and then I figured I could do deleted scenes and put all the things I removed from the chapters here. Some are unfinished – since I decided not to have them in the chapters. **

--

**Sean and Kaylee, talking about Flor and Kay hiding the bottle with the messages. **

Sean discovered that actually, Kaylee was quite nice. Not that they had much in common, despite this one thing that he couldn't help but mention, and that was the topic of Flor.

They both missed her. Not that he said it to her, always when he brought Flor up she would smile mischievously all the sudden. But sometimes she would just look sad, like she wanted to tell him something but couldn't.

"Do you think they're okay?"

This time she looked shocked. Dropped the knife and cut her finger. Dom was mad. He accused Sean of trying to murder her. Sean responded by saying that if he wanted to murder Kaylee he would have used a much smarter method with less witnesses. Dom said it was a confession.

It went on like that for a while until Kate smacked Dom over the head and dragged him off to get water.

"Sorry." Kaylee looked worried.

"It's all right."

She smiled and looked as her two friends walked away from them

"So, do you think they're okay?"

The frown was back on her face. "Um… well, uh… err. Sure, yeah… uh, they're sure… surely okay."

"Kaylee," he said and tried to catch her gaze, "is there something you know about it?"

"About what?"

"The raft, if they're safe or not."

She let out a nervous laugh. "No… Why would I do that?"

"I know when people lie."

"Yeah right like you're Mr. Perfect," Kaylee mumbled and Sean glared, he was standing right there!

Their discussion was interrupted once again when Dom decided he didn't think Sean should be anywhere near than twenty feet from Kay anymore. Which made Kay start to ramble on and on about how Dom couldn't control who she wanted to see. Then Dom apparently said a joke and they went walking away towards the sunset – well, the beach.

Those two were practically married. He wondered when they would realize it.

--

**Kaylee and Dom, after the fire. **

"I convinced Owen to show me all the books she got from Sawyer's stash but I found none about… um, you know your… condition."

"You mean the whole freaking legs-not-moving part?"

Dom nodded. He had thankfully not joked too much about it and she was glad for that.

"Kate wants to try to talk to Rosalie about it."

"No," Kaylee said immediately. "No we can't talk to her, we can't."

Dom nodded but he had that gleam in his eye.

"Dominic, promise me you won't." She glared at him and he sighed.

"Fine I won't."

--

**Flor being hyper. **

"I got a gun! I got a gun! I got a gun!" Flor cheered and accidentally fired it right into one of Sawyer's books.

"Next time, you should aim more to the left. Where Owen is." Sean smiled.

--

**An extended scene to a conversation between Shannon and Rosalie talking. **

"They're like totally best friends forever."

"Really?"

"Yeah. Some people think they're together, but Brian's not gay but Boone is so…"

"Shannon, Boone isn't gay."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Oh my god!"

--

**Margo and Zidler being ridiculous (cute) and sarcastic (actually honest.) **

"We'll be best friends forever, won't we Zidler?"

"Did I just end up in a 90's show?"

--

**Charlie and Claire talking about Aaron. **

"Aaron huh?"

Claire looked up and saw Charlie stand before her. He had his hands in his pockets and the hood over his head. She smiled. "Yes. Do you like it?"

"I think it's a great name. Though I preferred Turnip head of course."

Claire laughed and gazed down at her son.

"He's beautiful," Charlie said and watched the baby too. "And I mean it. Usually I'm forced to nod along and pretend that the crying little kid is the most precious thing in the world. But this little Turnip, he's really special."

--

**Boone and Brian, Shannon's obviously not dead and Brian is miraculously healed! **

"I'm glad you're okay man," Boone admitted.

"Yeah… thanks."

They both wondered if they would let the conversation turn into a sappy chick movie thing, but in the end, it was enough just to sit on the beach in silence. Words were not always needed.

"Get a room!" Shannon shouted, and by that, the sort of sentimental moment was ruined.

--

**Charlie and Zidler discussing Brian after he was miraculously healed. **

Brian was out in the water, the waves were high and he was desperately trying to surf. He stood up; fell and so it went over and over again.

On the beach Charlie and Zidler sat next to each other, eating papayas while watching the entertainment.

"I wonder if he can get hurt you know," Charlie said and took one of Zidler's pieces of the fruit. "If he can still bleed."

Zidler nodded slowly. "If he's a robot he wouldn't be able to. He could totally walk right into the jungle without getting eaten!"

"We should test that theory, where did you say you saw that polar bear again?"

--

**Rosalie and Sawyer. Fruit. Sawyer being Sawyer. Rosalie being… uh, Rosalie's legs not functioning. **

"Not another fruit!" Rosalie whined and put a hand on her forehead, sighing.

"Doc said they were nutritious, or somethin' like that. They'll help."

"Sawyer, fruit is not going to make me walk again," Rosalie told him, sighing in frustration.

"How about some fish then?"

"How'd you get fish?"

Sawyer smirked. "I got them from Tokyo Rose's husband, and by got I mean I stole them of course."

--

**The ****whole**** Wendy and Claret scene talking about pregnancy scene. **

Wendy growled with irritation.

"Wow, you sound like a mad dog." Claret smiled but the smile faded as Wendy scowled at her. "You really are angry, what's the matter?"

All of Wendy's instincts told her to scream and rage, but Claret was just so nice, and Wendy knew she would listen. "It's the whole pregnancy thing; everyone is making such a big deal about it."

Claret sat down beside the girl and leaned back against the tree. "Everyone thinks it's a big deal Wendy, a pregnant woman, when we're stranded here and with the fact that…" She bit her lip like she didn't want to say it. "That Karl is the… you know father."

Wendy snapped her neck around to look at Claret so fast it hurt. "What?"

"Margo told me."

Okay, Wendy didn't care that Margo was all crushing on Zidler she couldn't go around telling people things! Oh god, she was never gonna tell the truth was she? What if she wanted to make like a false belly and all – no, before it would come to that Wendy would already have told the whole camp about it. She was not going to wear a false pregnancy belly.

"Why," Wendy said through gritted teeth, "would Karl be the father?"

"Because Margo said you said so and because… you got this connection and you let him go after we took him and then gave him food in the jungle –"

Wendy's eyes widened. "You knew about that?"

"Yes," Claret smiled again, "you weren't very subtle about your feelings, the both of you. And while everyone has been very, well supportive, has anyone asked you if you, you know are planning to keep it?"

"Um…"

"Now when we're getting off the island, you do have a choice."

And that was something Wendy should have asked Margo, because she knew the girl wasn't too happy about getting knocked up, but she had just assumed it was fear – not that she maybe didn't want to have children… and this was all too confusing, because it shouldn't be her responsibility, caring about Margo, pretending.

"That's something I'll keep in mind." Wendy smiled weakly and thought that maybe; she could tell Claret the truth. She was mad at Margo for spreading the rumor further and the web of lies was now getting bigger and bigger.

"Guys!" It was Zidler, he had a weird look on his face as his eyes met Wendy's and then he turned his gaze to Claret. "Lori's making some kind of announcement, c'mon!"

--

**Rosalie and Lalita, sad. **

"Look what survived the crash." Rosalie smiled brightly and sat down next to her wife.

"It's the photo album!" Lalita took it and opened it up. Watching the photos with big eyes. "Oh, look Eva's so…" Lalita cleared her throat. "It's nice," she said and closed it.

--

**Sawyer is a bad influence on kids. **

"Smoking is bad." Allen removed the cigarette from Ellie's hand. "Where did you say Sawyer was again, princess?"

"Over there!" She grinned and pointed.

Claret sighed. "I'll watch her."

--

**Special look into Andrea's past**

**Notes: often, I write scenes and tidbits of the characters lives, not really flashbacks, but more so I get to know the characters. I usually delete them, but a bit of the Andrea ones I actually saved. Here they are:**

**--**

The first time Andrea Widmore saw a dead person, it wasn't one her father had killed, which she was silently happy about.

"Blimey!"

"You look beautiful Penelope."

That was not what Andrea intended to say, she thought Penelope looked like a marshmallow with her white puffy dress and pink hat, absolutely ridiculous. The dress should've been on someone smaller, like Andrea herself. Not that her father cared about that. Penny was the oldest, so Penny got to follow their father everywhere while little Andy had to stay home.

"Are you ready my dear?" their father asked. For one moment Andy thought she saw something like pride when he looked at his eldest daughter. Penny caught her sister's eye. They looked very similar. Their eyes were just as blue and curious and they were both slender, but Andy was smaller and while Penny's hair was blonde and beautiful Andrea's was frizzy and too curly. Penny was always the beautiful one of them. Still, Andy smiled and waved goodbye as they left for their dinner party or presidential meeting or whatever her father had come up with this time.

And she was alone. Well, not exactly alone, their big house was always filled with different people all the time. But in the Widmore family, she was alone.

She guessed she could've made friends, in school, if they weren't so stuck-up and annoying, but her only real friend was her sister, Penelope. And now Penelope wasn't here.

She wanted to go outside, into the town, but when you were thirteen and looked like nine (she'd gotten mistaken for six once, but she was sure that guy had been drunk) and with an overprotective father who probably had spies set up all around the town it wasn't that easy.

She skipped up the creaking stairs up to her big room, she had her own, but most nights she would drag her mattress into Penny's room – she had nightmares every night. She threw herself down on the bed and looked up at the roof above her, filled with painted stars.

"Miss Andrea," her nanny of the moment, Miss Hatcher said and peeked into her room. "Your father said you would study tonight."

"Nah," Andy said, "I don't want to study tonight, it's boring."

Usually she did these things together with her sister, but now she was in a terrible mood, she still didn't really know Miss Hatcher, if she was one of those pushovers or a tyrant, she would see…

"Miss Andrea Elizabeth Widmore, I'll have to insist!"

A tyrant. The woman stepped into the room. Light brown short hair and intense, narrow eyes that glared at her.

"Nope," Andrea answered and she knew her nonchalant tone was upsetting the woman.

"If you don't you will get no supper."

"What is this? No supper? Please, my father will fire you if you even try to do something like that. Go hang yourself."

The woman scowled at her. Her face showed even more deep wrinkles. "No supper then."

Andrea snorted. This woman wouldn't dare to threaten her. But when she came down to get some dinner; there she was standing in front of the fridge like she owned the place. "You know this is child abuse?" yelled Andrea from the top of the stairs. "My father is so going to hear about this! Then you'll never get a job anymore in your entire life! Then you'll be just miserable and depressed until you kill yourself!"

When she the next morning entered the kitchen. She saw than her nanny had hung herself with wires to the kitchen roof. Andrea yawned. Then she screamed. And hoped that she would at least get something to eat in the next century.

--

The second time someone around Andrea died, it was her girlfriend Tessa.

Andrea hadn't really expected to find someone at her private school that she actually could get along with besides Penny. But one day Tessa stepped into the classroom, her skirt a bit shorter than the regulations and her fiery orange hair stood out like a rose in wasteland. Her smile was big and seductive, even when the other girls and boys silently teased her and the teachers yelled. With a bang she threw her books down on the desk next to Andy and introduced herself. Loud, in front of everyone.

That was what Andy guessed was love in first sight. Because she loved Tessa as soon as she saw her, because Tessa was different, special, she wasn't like everyone else. Like Andrea herself.

Penny didn't like Tessa though. And that was the first time Andy felt some slight dislike for her sister. Penny only saw a chain-smoking troublemaker, while Andy saw so much more in her. She saw and loved how Andy dared to question the system around them, how she dared to disagree with the boys and openly say out loud exactly what she thought of the principal and the female students being called in at the late afternoons for 'talks'.

And she liked the way Tessa kissed her. Their first kiss, Andy's first kiss had been kind of awkward at first. Andrea had no idea what to do, but Tessa knew and she didn't make fun of the way Andy blushed or stammered, she just smiled and was so sweet and lovely. This made Andy like her even more.

Tessa knew how Andy felt about her father, yet she still wouldn't let it go. "I'd like to meet him," she said, in the middle of a conversation they had about the math homework.

"What?" Andy blinked confused.

"Your father. I'd like to meet him."

Andy stared at her, Tessa had changed her hair a week before to blue. "Um… my father's really –"

"I know he is all overprotective and an evil mastermind Andy, but I'm your girlfriend. I'd like to meet him."

Andy imagined her father shaking hands with Tessa, and what would happen if she said that Tessa wasn't her friend, but something so much more. "Tess, we've already had this discussion. You know what I think about it."

"If he doesn't like me we can just make out on his bed to tick him off," Tessa told her and grinned. Andy felt irritated. She had explained and explained but no one would understand how it was like to have Charles Widmore as your father.

"No, you can't see him and that's final!" Now she even sounded like her father. Tessa glared at her and shut her mouth. They didn't talk that much for the rest of the day.

Her father was home again from one of his business trips and as always he decided they would have a nice family dinner. Andrea and Penny sat beside each other and their father on the opposite side. For each year that went she found it harder to communicate with him, they were just so different.

"How was school today?"

Andrea glanced at Penny for help and Penny responded quickly and threw herself down in a long out-drawn story about the algebra test they had today.

The doorbell rang, and Andrea would usually not answer it, but today she just wanted to get way from everything. So she stood up and rushed out of the dining room to answer the door. When she opened it, she saw a flick of blue hair and tried to close it again, but Tessa was faster and put her foot in and Andy had no choice but to open the door.

"What are you doing here?" she hissed.

"Can't a girlfriend visit her girlfriend anymore? What has the world come to?" Tessa joked.

"You can't be here!"

"But Andy, we never hang out in your house."

"You didn't come here to hang out! You came here to see my father!"

"Who is it?"her father called, and his voice was determined, his business voice.

"No one!" Andy yelled, and then she whispered to Tessa. "Haven't you seen any TV shows or movies? These things always end badly! You could end up dead by the roadside tomorrow!"

Tessa laughed. And her father came up behind her. And he glared. And Tessa walked over the doorstep, and oh, Penny gasped really loudly and didn't catch any of the secret hand signals which meant 'danger!' coming from Andy.

"Hello Mr. Widmore!" Tessa said cheerfully and let out a hand to shake his. "I'm Tessa Wesson."

Her father just stared shocked at Tessa's colorful appearance. Her father was never caught off guard.

"I'm sure Andrea has told you lots about me."

Andy hadn't. Tessa knew that. What was she doing?

"You're here to find out the homework for tomorrow, aren't you Tessa?" Penny turned to their father. "Tessa goes in the same class as Andrea, Tessa was sick today and she just came here to hear about what she has to study."

Andy loved her sister.

"Actually," Tessa said. "I came here to spend some time with Andrea my –"

Andy didn't love Tessa right now.

"- girlfriend."

The end of the world didn't end in a cascade of flames, but more in the sharp inhale of her father. When he turned to her…

She decided she would've preferred the flames.

--

**A Christmas miracle happened, and I am much better now!**

**Love you guys. Thank you for all your support in this story. I hope you enjoyed this. Happy Holidays! **


	25. Beautiful and Still

To mar the bright, the perfect flow'r,  
But all is beautiful and still —  
And golden sands proclaim the hour  
Which brings no ill.

_Sleep on, sleep on, some fairy dream  
Perchance is woven in thy sleep —  
But, O, thy spirit, calm, serene,  
Must wake to weep._

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 22, Beautiful and Still **

----

Florence fingered on the ring, took it on, took it off and just looked at it. It was quite beautiful. And she'd worn it in many years. Still she wanted more. Her gaze lifted and she smiled when she saw Byron putting Jeremy's boots on, the kid was chatting happily and clapped his hands together in excitement when his father opened the door.

"We'll be back soon!" Byron walked over to her; with his shoes on she noticed. He leaned down and kissed her.

"You're a bad example," she whispered to him while grinning as Jeremy, following his father's way as usual, skipped over to her with his boots on and hugged her goodbye too.

"Bye!" Jeremy called out before the door closed behind them. Florence sighed, let the ring slide back on her finger and closed her eyes.

It was her day off and she couldn't think of anything to do. She could've gone with them, but she knew that it was father and son bonding time, and she didn't want to interfere with that. On the table before her, a cell phone laid.

It started to ring.

Immediately she pressed the answer button. "Hey, this is Flor."

"_Oh, I'm sorry… I called the wrong number…"_

"This is the third time you've called the wrong number in the last three days."

"_Yes, I'm so sorry. I won't call this number again, really."_

"Don't hang up!" Flor said quickly. "Is it Byron you're looking for?"

"_I… I… I really don't know who Byron is."_

Florence had a long time ago accepted the fact that she was a somewhat creepy fiancée with a stalker thing. At first when she'd seen the signs she'd shrugged them off, but now she got reasons to act like this. "Strange, he got your number in his contact list, are you sure it's not Byron you're looking for?"

"_I'm really sure! So, goodbye!"_

The woman hung up. Her heart raced and guilt washing over her, she really was irrational. Flor stared at the name on the screen for a long time, _Bella._

----

Slowly she opened her eyes. Heard the small smatter of the rain. Her hand curled around something, someone else's hand.

Florence gasped, pulled her hand away and she struggled up to her feet. With a relieved sigh she realized she was at the camp, it was night and there were no flashing screens close. Still the nightmare echoed in her head. Fire. Always was it fire.

"Sean," she said and shook the guy that had fallen asleep watching over her, "Sean, wake up!"

He blinked, yawned and blinked again in surprise when he saw her smiling at him. A smile spread across his face. "Flor…"

Flor grinned. "Where's the welcome back cake?"

--

Jack had returned to the beach only to find Sean return a moment later, that Claret, Kay and Claire had left on a mission and to see Flor, Michael and the dog Vincent come strolling towards the camp.

"She's dehydrated." Michael had helped Sean carry her to Jack's tent. "It's not bad really, she's just tired. I promise you, she's not hurt."

"What happened to you?" Jack had asked as he tried to make Flor drink. It wasn't easy because she had in fact, passed out.

"When she wakes up I'll tell you."

Flor was still not awake, and Sean stayed by her side. Michael had been tired and left for his old shelter, and Dom said he'd make sure no one tried to disturb him.

"Is she okay?" Lori asked and sat down beside him on the sand. She was sitting so close her hair tickled his cheek.

"Yes, I think she is. But I don't want to talk about it right now."

"That's okay."

"No." Jack shook his head. "We have to go after Claire."

"What?"

"They – the others, they made a deal with us, we aren't supposed to go in and explore in the jungle! We're not supposed to be on their territory. And now three of us have left!"

"I get your point. Really, I do. But Jack, you make a lot of decisions, decisions leaders make. But they don't see you as their leader. They made their choice. We can't go after them and drag them back like they're children."

"And it will be their blood on our hands." Jack sighed.

"They will be fine. And you should sleep, just like the rest of us." Lori stood up. And Jack wasn't looking at her… he could've imagined it – but it felt like one of her fingers gently stroke his cheek before she left.

--

"We'll just have to survive without a fire."

At that moment, flames began to spread in front of them and Kay shouted in victory.

Claret giggled and pulled the blanket closer around her. "Good it's not raining too much. Who will take the first watch?"

"I'll do it!" Claire shouted. "You guys need sleep, especially you Kay."

"I'm okay, really." It wasn't true, her legs ached painfully and her head throbbed. But she had managed to keep up a good pace and she did try her hardest not to be a liability. Still, Claire had volunteered.

Kaylee lay down on the ground. The roots hurt her back, her legs hurt, and it was hard to sleep when everything was hurting. After a while she could hear Claret snore lightly and was slightly irritated that she'd fallen asleep while she couldn't.

Kay turned around but the new position wasn't more comfortable.

"Are you still awake?" Claire whispered.

Kay nodded. "I can't sleep even though the rain has stopped. Do you want me to take your shift?"

Claire shook her head. "No, I… I won't be able to sleep either."

"You should sleep, get strength for tomorrow."

"No, I can't. And you should too."

They were silent for a while as Kay closed her eyes, she tried to keep her mind off things but she couldn't find rest. "Why won't you be able to sleep?" she finally asked.

"Because of my son. Why can't you sleep?"

"I just… I just can't."

A crashing sound, an echo of a howl screeched through the trees. Kay sat up quickly. "Gun!"

Claret blinked and struggled up on her feet. "What was that?"

Claire grabbed the gun from the side of the bonfire, an unwise decision to lay it there. "I don't know."

"The gun! Give it to me!" Kay told her and watched the jungle. She jumped as the strange clanking sound was heard again.

"Why?"

"I know how to use it!" Kay pulled it from her hands. "Claret!"

Claret looked at her with big eyes; she was shaking and moved closer to Claire. "Yes?"

"Put the fire out –"

"KAYLEE!"

The ground shook below their feet. And the earth broke in cracks. No, it was the tree beside her that was drawn from its roots. She fell on her back, all air out of her lungs. Claret screamed. More dirt fell in her face. She spat and tried to breathe.

"It's the monster! I've seen it… I've seen it…"

Someone pulled her up on her feet and Kay saw through the tears the fallen tree lying on the ground. On the other side Claret stood, shaking.

"RUN!" Claire screamed at her and Claret disappeared into the dark. Kay coughed. She hissed with pain but she and Claire managed to climb over the roots. She didn't turn around. She heard the sounds. Screeching, clank, trees pulled from the roots.

"RUN!" Kay yelled again and they darted through the still standing trees. Stumbled over the rocks and ran wildly away from whatever was hunting them.

"Claret!" Claire's hand was sweaty and Kay's hand was slipping out of her grip. "CLARET!"

"Claire…" Kay tried to get a better grip around her hand, but Claire was running too fast.

"CLARET!"

Kay panted, her whole body was protesting, Claire's should too. "Claire we need to take cover – _Claire!_"

Kay pulled her hand and they fell to the ground. "Come!" Kay crawled, stumbled into the banyan trees. "Quiet," she whispered and they sat down. Hands wrapped together as they sat hunched in the dark.

It was unlike any sound she'd heard, it wasn't natural, it was no storm, no animal. But she knew what whatever it was – was circling around them. Adrenaline pumped through her body but she was blinded with fear, she didn't want to make any sounds, but she couldn't help but to inhale loudly.

Claire whimpered by her side, and then the air around them was lit up. White flashes. She covered her eyes but they continued. Claire gave out a yell and then the sounds faded away.

"What was that?" Kay whispered, still hiding.

"I…" Claire turned her face to hers. "I have no idea. We have to find Claret –"

The sound of a scream broke through the night.

--

"I watched them for days; they didn't know I was there. I saw where they kept Flor, but sometimes they would take her out for walks. And one day I struck, I overthrew the guard and we fled. It was days, days before we found a good path and still – we walked in circles. It was hard but eventually... we got here. I saved her. Isn't that right, I saved you Flor?"

Flor blinked and looked up at the faces watching her. "Yeah… that's about it."

"But what happened to you? When you were captured?"

Flor blinked again and looked at Sean like she'd never seen him before, her eyes tired. "They… they kept me locked in day and night in that prison. Then Michael rescued me. That's all."

"You had band-aids over your body." Jack watched her with a confused face.

"They liked to take my blood. I don't know why. I'm just glad Michael got me out of there okay? Nothing else happened."

"Did you see anyone else? Walt?"

Flor looked down at the ground and bit her lip.

"No," Michael said. "She told me, she didn't."

"Can you please just leave me alone?" Flor curled her hand together in a fist, like she was fighting against the tears. "I'm tired. A lot of things have happened right… I've answered your questions."

"Okay, but if you feel worse come and get me." Jack stood up and he and Michael left together.

Sean sighed and began to walk away.

"What are you doing?" Flor reached out a hand that she let fall down by her side.

Sean raised his eyebrows. "You told us to leave…"

"Yeah… can you stay? Please?"

"Yeah, yeah sure." Sean sat down in front of her.

"Don't worry," Flor smiled, "I'm too exhausted to run away from you right now."

Sean chuckled. "I guess you want me to fill you in on everything that's happened?"

Flor nodded slowly. "Of course, but not right now."

Sean smiled but looked confused. He tilted his head to the side. "Why?"

"There's something else I need to do first." Flor stared into his eyes. She leaned forward, so close their lips were almost touching, and when they did, when she pressed her lips against his first gently – but then with force he was surprised.

But he wasn't so surprised when she pulled back, grinned and rushed off before he could say a thing.

----

"I think Byron's cheating on me."

Allison dropped the mug. Luckily, it didn't shatter but it did spill hot coffee over her pants and over the floor. "Bloody hell!" Allison exclaimed and immediately went to the floor to wipe it off; Flor helped her even though she was supposed to attend to customers.

"So you finally found out huh?" Allison said without meeting Flor's gaze, rubbing the floor with the towel too eagerly.

"Finally found out?" Flor said in a high-pitched tone. "What… I said I think… What the hell is that supposed to men Allie?"

"Oh honey," Allison said sympathetic. She looked down at the big stain on her shirt. "I need to change clothes."

"Take over for me please!" Flor shouted at one of the waiters and followed Allison back into the changing room.

"Allison!" she barked. "What…"

Allison looked at Flor over her shoulder, and said in a tone adults used to five year olds when explaining that one and one becomes two, "What was the first clue?"

"The… the… He is cheating?" Flor sat down, missed the bench and fell on the floor. Instead of getting up she leaned against the wall instead, staring at her with big eyes.

Allison bit her lip and finally had the manners to look a bit ashamed. "Honey, yeah, it's kind of obvious. All those women he's seen with, all those 'business trips' and when he shoves his tongue down their throat then it's really obvious."

"I just…" Flor was in too much shock to scream at Allison. "There was this woman always calling him and I just…"

"Thought there was only one? Oh, girl." Allison sat down next to her on the dirty floor and put an arm around her. Something back in Flor's mind told her to shrug it off, scream at the girl who knew that her fiancé was cheating on her and just… But she didn't have the strength. All of her hopes… their lives it was all one big lie. It crushed her inside, drained her off air and she could barely keep her head straight.

"I'm engaged to him." And that was when she realized exactly what Byron had done to her, and that cheating bastard was now out with her son. "I have to go!"

----

Zidler was just strolling by the trees, playing with his cards when he heard the sob. He assumed it was from some kind of animal at first, but then there was a snivel and when he looked in at the trees he saw someone sitting on a rock not too far away.

He wondered for a moment if he should get Rosalie, or maybe Margo or someone who could talk about feelings when he realized that the person crying – was in fact Margo.

"Hello," he said awkwardly. Margo turned around and when she saw it was him, she immediately tried to hide her tears, but it was useless. She couldn't stop crying and he'd already seen them.

"Oh… oh…" Was all she said and then turned away from him.

He climbed up on the rock, it was wet from the rain and he almost fell a few times before he managed to sit down beside her. "What's the matter?"

And those few words made her break down in tears again, they rolled down her face into her hands and she sobbed violently. He felt himself choke up at the sight of her. Zidler quickly pulled her into a hug and she continued to cry against his shoulder.

--

"It's good to hear you again Mikey!"

Michael hugged Lori back. "It's good to be back."

They both pulled away from the hug and Lori smiled.

"So Michael," Wendy said and sat down on one of the benches, "what happened to you?"

"It's a long story –"

"That he's so not gonna tell," Lori said with determination. She turned to Michael and whispered, "You need rest, I can tell them…"

"No, no Lori it's fine. I'm fine. Really. I don't mind…" At his words, many of the survivors that had been eavesdropping on them moved closer.

Lori considered making a bonfire, even though it was in the middle of the day – just for the effect.

"I travelled for days, just wandered around in the jungle. I didn't really know where I was going, and even if I wanted to return I wouldn't have been able to. Then, suddenly I saw one of them and I followed her back to their camp – and their camp… They were living in huts, walking around barefoot eating fish – they are worse off than we are!"

Lori thought about Karl, that other guy they caught with him and then the man in the hatch. They'd seemed so sure of themselves.

"I watched them for days – but I didn't see my son, none that seemed to be a prisoner like the kids you're talking about. But then… I saw Flor. They would sometimes take her out for walks and that was when I managed to get her and escape. My son was with her, he was there! We decided to return to tell you guys, and Flor was weak. She wasn't able to help me rescue my son… but the important thing is – they had like what, two guns? We are far more than that! We could take them! We could rescue my son!"

--

"It's your entire fault," Kaylee muttered.

Claire looked at her over her shoulder. "My fault?"

"Yes," Kaylee jumped over a root, "it's your fault we got no water, no food absolutely no weapons to defend ourselves at all. If you had just listened to me –"

"You mean your suggestion of returning to get out backpacks and the gun? I thought that maybe finding our friend was far more important!" she shouted. She crossed her arms and shuddered even though it was unbelievably warm in the jungle.

"And oh, how has that worked out for you? I don't see Claret anywhere in sight!" Kaylee immediately regretted her words; she saw how Claire put a hand to her head and gave out a shivering sigh.

"I'm… I'm sorry. We have to find Claret I'm just…"

"Awfully tired and hungry?" Claire laughed quietly. "I'm that too. I really wish we had some of those Dharma boxes with food now."

They walked on in silence until the ground was more and more covered in long grass that almost reached over their knees and the jungle cleared.

Kaylee looked up at the burning sun. "What do you think that was?"

"Claret was screaming that it was the monster, it sounded like that thing – the first night. Do you remember it?"

"Yeah… I do."

"I hope she's all right," Claire whispered. "Should we take a break?"

Kaylee restrained herself from screaming 'oh god yes thank you!'. They sat down on a tree stump, Kaylee putting one of her legs up.

"Kay!" Claire yelled at the sight of the blood. "You should've said something! We need the salve right away!"

"We don't have the salve remember?" Kay bit her lip and tried not to wince as she looked down at her legs. "We lost all our packing."

Claire's hands fell loosely at her sides. "Oh... yes. We should try to find some water, it was raining and…" She stood up slowly, blinked and stared at the tree stump Kay was sitting on.

"Claire – what is it?" Kaylee asked carefully and put her leg down, and flinched.

"I… I recognize this – I know where we are!" Claire took off running.

Kay blinked. "Um, Claire, hello?" But Claire didn't stop. With a whine she stood up, tried to ignore the throbbing pain and rushed after her. "Claire!"

"It's here…" Claire's hand touched the ground. "I know it's here. Somewhere…"

Kay took one step to the side.

Claire stared at her.

"Did the ground just say _ping?_" Kay asked. Claire pushed her to the side and pulled away the vines and plants covering the hatch door.

"You found it! I-I remember… You found it!" Claire laughed and Kaylee joined her laughter. She was so relieved that one thing had gone right.

"CLAIRE?"

They swung around, and from the forest a dark-haired, nervous woman came out. Her feet bare and bleeding, her eyes big and scared. Claret smiled weakly when Kaylee hugged her.

--

"Please, please stop crying." Wendy made a frustrated sigh. She'd done everything to make him silent. She'd even let Owen sing for the baby for goodness sake! But little Aaron refused to shut up. He just wailed and wailed and with every cry Wendy got madder and madder.

"_Please,_" she begged again. How Claire could stand this she had absolutely no idea. She had a newfound respect for the woman. But maybe it was easier when the child was yours.

Aaron, who probably was crying only to annoy her, wrinkled his face once again and let out a long wail. Wendy groaned and patted the baby's back softly. Margo _so_ owed her a hundred times for this.

Margo.

Wendy blinked and looked at the jungle. She saw Zidler and Margo walk out of it. Zidler had a hand on her shoulder and Margo looked a little tearful, but Wendy was too far away to make sure. Immediately she stalked towards them with angry steps.

"Hey!" she shouted over Aaron's cries.

Zidler looked up, surprised. Margo stared at the baby, terrified.

"Here!" Wendy dumped the baby in Margo's arms. "It's good practice once you become a parent, see you guys later."

Wendy smiled to herself and she left them staring after her in shock.

--

"Huh."

"What?" Sean asked, trying to fit the pieces of the satellite phone back together.

"You're grinning like a madman. It's kind of freaky. Now I know why you don't smile often."

"Do you want me to fix this or not?"

"You want to get rescued right? Miss Widmore did not mention you would all be ungrateful –"

"_Widmore?_" Andrea squeaked. Sean looked up and saw her gape at Naomi. He sighed and went back to the phone.

"Yes, Widmore," Naomi said with an arched eyebrow. "Penelope Widmore, she who sent us to rescue you."

"What? Why didn't you tell us about this?" Andrea sounded exasperated.

"I did say it, and why does it matter to you?"

Andrea crossed her arms, opened her mouth and then closed it again. A few seconds went as she seemed to think of what to say. "How did she organize this?" she finally said, "This search and rescue mission?"

"I was just hired –"

Andrea's eyes flickered a bit and she was clearly nervous. "Did she give you specific instructions? More than find the dead people at the bottom of the ocean – how did she even know we were alive? How did you even find the island?"

"I've told all of you this – no one did mention you would all be ungrateful jerks." Naomi threw an angry glare Sean's way (he had actually done nothing but to work on the phone) before she stormed off.

Andrea was practically fuming. "When that thing works," she said without looking at Sean, "don't tell her, tell me first. Whatever you do, do not mention it to her."

--

Fox knew they were planning something. Something bad. It was driving him insane, watching Michael tell a lie, watching Flor skip around the camp like she'd never left. He wondered if they knew they were being manipulated too, because he knew their story was false, but it was possible they didn't know it was false at all.

His people were smart. They let them escape to the camp for a reason, and whatever reason it was he knew it was going to hurt for the survivors. And there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.

Brian snapped his fingers in front of Fox. "Hey! We have a mysterious logbook to translate. You coming?"

"Yeah, yeah." Fox was still staring at Flor, she was chatting happily with Libby further down the beach.

Brian gritted his teeth, but couldn't help but almost curl his lips up in a smile. "Kim will be there."

"I-I thought you hated her."

"I do, it's just that otherwise she will go around and make a big deal out of the ship thing. And I don't want that." He sighed. "Everyone already thinks I'm… err, come on then!"

The three of them sat down with the journal and the notes, Kim glanced now and then down at the notes but mostly she was just watching Fox try to translate what it was saying.

"Here he-he writes about the d-dinner he had… It was chicken and –"

"Fox, I'm not really interested in what they ate. Get to the good stuff."

"What kind of good stuff?" Kim leaned forward.

"Like how their ship came to be in the middle of the jungle."

"Oh... right…" Fox turned a few pages, frowned, and turned a few more.

It was not the funniest entertainment.

"So," Kim said, "isn't it… um, interesting that Flor and Michael are back? Do you think they will lead us to the Others?"

"What does it say?" Brian asked Fox quickly, ignoring Kim's questions.

"I think it's really cool. I really hope they manage to get Eva back," Kim said just as fast.

"If it's about food just skip it."

"And Zack and Emma, I hope they haven't hurt them. What do you think Fox?"

"What does it say Edwards?"

Fox looked up at them dazed. "Have you g-guys said something? I was reading."

--

Ana-Lucia found that Ellie, a little kid, was far smarter than the rest of the survivors she'd met after the place crash.

For one, Ellie had good priorities, while many of the survivors at the camp's problems were accidental pregnancy, who's flirting with whom and stealing; Ellie had the basics down. Eat, sleep, make sure her daddy had brushed his teeth and have fun when all the other things were done.

So it was only natural that Ellie gave the best advices.

"What do you think of the rescue?" Ana asked her as they were together cleaning the dining table.

"I think that it's weird that one person's is gonna rescue _all_ of us," Ellie said with wide eyes, "We're many. I can't carry forty people. How can she? And her eye twitches weird, she's clearly lying."

--

Zidler crinkled his nose. "I think he needs a new diaper."

Margo made a sound that could've been a whine and was still looking at Aaron like he was her new enemy.

"I don't think he's going to harm you!" Zidler told Margo with a huff. "He's a baby!"

Margo leaned closer to him and whispered, "He's looking at me like he knows what I'm thinking."

All right, Zidler could agree to that. The baby had freakishly blue eyes and when he wasn't crying he had this weird serious expression on his face.

"Back to point," Margo said, "how do you change a diaper?"

"It shouldn't be too hard." Zidler looked at the white things Claire had left behind. "But these are just pieces of garment or something!"

"We need professional help, here, hold him." Margo handed Aaron over to a very reluctant Zidler.

"Hey," he shouted after her as she walked away, "where are you going?"

"To get professional help like I said!"

--

Sawyer took up one of the water bottles, inspected it for a moment before he tasted it. "Damn it's just water!"

Rosalie looked over her shoulder at him. "What is it?"

"Little miss David Bowie stole all my alcohol, and she has disguised it instead of hiding it."Sawyer sighed and slumped down beside her. "How are you holding up?"

"About what?" Rosalie said a little too quickly.

Sawyer raised his eyebrows. "Your wife running off to find Otherville."

"I'm sure she's fine," Rosalie said casually, but there was a knot in her chest of worry.

"She missed Mikey's speech." Sawyer's voice was toned by something else, and Rosalie knew what he wanted to ask.

"I talked to Florence. She said she didn't see Eva there."

"Okay… I gotta go talk to Einstein." Sawyer stood up, took one step before he turned to her again, hesitating. "You okay there?"

Rosalie smiled faintly. "Yes… yes I am."

--

A light bulb flickered in the corridor. On the wall a logo is painted, _the staff_ was written on it. To their left there were two doors, Kaylee tried to open both of them but they were locked.

"I would've felt safer with a gun," Claret admitted while she hugged herself, looking frightened at the dirty-white walls. "Is that a spider? I think it's a spider. We should get out of here. What if the spiders are mutated or something?"

"Come on," Claire whispered. They didn't think anyone was there, it was deserted, but they had seen enough things to be scared.

"They could be mutated. I bet the Others mutates insects, oh God we're gonna be killed by mutated bees!"

"This one's open…" Claire pushed the door open. Claret gasped at the sight that met them.

The room was perfectly decorated, a crib was in a corner of the room, toys were lined up in shelves, a rocking chair in another corner.

"They kept me here – they said this was for Aaron…" Claire bent down and took up something small in her hand. A little blue sock. "I did this."

"This is just…" Claret shook her head, couldn't find the words. Somehow the baby blue walls and the paintings of animals were far scarier than the empty corridor and the hidden hatch door.

Kaylee walked over to the crib, over it hung a mobile covered in small, toy airplanes. Ironic. When she turned it on it started playing a song, she recognized it but couldn't place it.

"I remember now." Claire sat down on the big bed as the song played. "I remember it all."

Claret sat down beside her and put an arm round the girl, looking like she wished to run away rather than stay. "What…" Was all she said, it was all that was needed.

Claire dried away the tears that began to well up in her eyes. "It's all a façade."

Kaylee still stood by the crib, she didn't know if she wanted to go and put an arm around Claire too or just… She wasn't good at this. Giving comfort. She was often the one receiving it. So she just stayed.

Claire inhaled deeply. "Owen's lying."

The lamps sparked, flickered and then the whole station's lights went down. Claret screamed in surprise and for a few seconds all that could be heard was silence before they took action.

Kay grasped after the closest thing that could be used as a weapon, which was ironically a small lamp. But there was no one storming in.

"Maybe…" Claire whispered.

"I think we should get out of here," Claret said.

A loud clanking noise was heard from above.

"I agree."

Kay's eyes adjusted slightly to the darkness around her and she could make out certain shapes, but it didn't stop her from accidentally walking into a wall. She did manage to open the door to the corridor though.

"Ouch. You crushed my toes."

"Stop it Claire."

"What? It wasn't me."

"Can you please keep quiet?"

"Why?"

"Guys…" Kay tried to get the doors to open. "I… I think we're locked in."

"What?" Claire pushed at the doors. "No…"

Kay decided not to panic, not yet. But sudden loose of light and the mysteriously locked doors to an underground hatch weren't really calming the situation. "Do you think smashing the lamp against it will help?"

Claire shrugged. "If it makes you feel better –"

"We're gonna die!" Claret twisted her hands.

"Don't be scared," Claire said in a soothing voice she usually only used for Aaron or Zidler. "I'm sure there's another way out…"

"There is," a voice said from behind them, "but that escape hatch will not be used by you."

Claret began to scream but was quickly silenced. Kay didn't have time to think. She lashed out with the lamp but their attacker grabbed her arm tight. She gasped and the lamp fell to the ground, breaking and shattering around their feet.

"Run!" she yelled, but there was no place to escape to. She could see the form of Claret's body on the ground but Claire – Claire threw herself on their attacker, and Kay found her arm free.

Two against one. Claret still wasn't standing. It should be easy. But suddenly Claire was on the floor too with a puddle of blood forming around her head.

Kay kicked, clawed and tried her hardest to hurt the other person. She saw a glimpse of his face, a scar stretched over his eye all the way down to his chin, breaking his lips. One moment of recognition. One moment of hesitation.

And she was thrown into the wall, head slamming and teeth clenching. Pain. Extinguishing pain. Blood dripping down into her mouth. And then the little she saw of the world faded, until there was only darkness before her eyes.

--

"There, done."

"Can you do that again?" Margo asked Rosalie. "I kind of missed it."

Rosalie smiled. "It's not that hard."

Zidler took Aaron up in his arms, looking at Rosalie gratefully. "Thank you."

"You're very welcome. But why isn't Wendy taking care of him?"

"I don't know. She just gave him to us and left with Hurley to play golf," said Zidler and started to make grimaces to entertain Aaron. Aaron yawned.

"Hmm, she's the one who needs the experience after all." Rosalie bit her lip, but then she waved at them and left to stop Sawyer from ruining their water supply.

"Yeah, do you think we should give him back?" Zidler said turned to Margo.

"I think she's too busy." Margo looked down the beach; Hurley and Wendy were playing golf. She giggled as they accidentally hit Lori with one of the clubs.

--

Fox was sitting by his tent, flipping thought the pages of the Black Rock journal. His face pinched in concentration. The sun was at the edge of the sea, the sky darker and some of the survivors had already made up fires for the night.

"Hey." Fox looked up and saw Kim who had just skipped over to his side. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she was smiling widely. She flopped down beside him.

"Brian just yelled at me," she said quickly. "I'm sorry for distracting you before." Her gaze turned to the book he was holding. "Like I'm doing now."

Fox grinned. "It's all r-right."

"So," Kim raised an eyebrow, a technique Fox still hadn't mastered quite yet, "have you fallen off a cliff?"

"W-what?"

Kim pointed at his arms. "They're covered in bruises."

Fox looked down and saw that the sleeves had gotten rolled up. All color disappeared from his face as he pulled them down to cover the blue and red skin. "Yes," he said without looking at her.

Kim frowned. Suddenly worried. "Are you –"

"Hello, hello Amethyst!" They both were distracted by a very drunk southerner. He held a water bottle in his hand, but the content was clearly not water at all. He slouched down beside Kim, putting an arm around her.

"What…" she said but Sawyer put a finger to her lips. Fox once again proved that he could in fact get paler than a ghost.

"Isn't it a lovely eve-evening!" Sawyer slurred, waving with the bottle and almost hit Andrea who walked by with it. "You should dance for us Amethyst! Don't ya think she should do that Geeky?"

Kim inhaled sharply, pushed Sawyer's arm away and stood up quickly. "See you later," she mumbled to Fox before she ran away from them.

"Why so upset?" Sawyer yelled after her.

--

"Is it almost finished?"

Sean looked up. Flor was smiling shyly, nodding at the phone.

"Hopefully… yes."

He turned around and put the phone down on the stub of a table. His fingers lingered on it for a while before he turned around to face Flor again, to say _something._

Her eyes were big – watching him with what could be curiosity or something else. She moved in to kiss him softly, maybe even quickly, but Sean cupper her face and pulled her in closer before she could run away. Kissing her slowly, tasting every single movement, every single second. She gasped slightly but returned the kiss almost hungry.

A loud, appreciating wolf-whistle interrupted them.

Owen waved at them, laughing.

Flor looked into his eyes with raised eyebrows. A smile playing on her lips. Sean grinned back, with one last look at Owen who was now making inappropriate gestures he took Flor's hand and pulled her into his shelter, closing it behind them.

----

Jeremy darted into the room, his clothes had green stains on them and he smelled of fresh cut-grass and rain. She didn't bother telling him not to go into their apartment with boots on… she felt so tired.

"We're back!" Byron took off his shoes. "How's my little flower?" Byron smiled charmingly and leaned in to kiss her. With one hand she pushed him gently away. He looked confused at her, but Flor turned to their son.

"Jeremy, could you go to your room for a while?"

Jeremy wrinkled his face. "Are you gonna have a grownup talk?"

Flor managed a smile just for him. "Yes we are – and oh, you are allowed to play really loud music."

And at this Byron looked even more bewildered, but Jeremy just cheered and still with the boots on his feet he closed the door to his room.

Flor looked out the window, at the city turning on its lights, at the sun fading and fading, at the night closing in. "I know about the affairs Byron."

His tone was slick, what she had before seen as charming did now sound sarcastic, playful, "You mean the business affairs?"

Flor swung around, still not meeting his gaze, her face flustered. "You very well know what I mean! I'm talking about – about all the women, the phone calls… I know."

Byron sighed deeply and sat down on the couch. "Took you long enough."

Flor blinked, unsure she'd heard right. He wasn't defending himself. Wasn't even angry. Finally, she looked at him. "W-what?"

His eyes were dark and the expression on his face was unfamiliar. She shuddered inwards, he didn't look like the man she fell in love with.

"You were accusing me of sleeping with other women right?"

She'd heard what he'd said. She just couldn't believe it. She inhaled sharply. "You – you…"

"We are miserable, Flor."

"We… we aren't miserable." She sounded pathetic even in her own ears. "We're happy…" And yet, here he was admitting he'd been cheating on her. "We were going to get married."

"Do you really see yourself as marriage material?" He chuckled lightly. "You can barely be in a relationship; you can barely take care of a child."

"Then… then why?"

"Because of Jeremy. He deserves better, far better than you."

Flor had gone limp, she looked weak to him. Never would she be good enough. No, she was, but not to him. She gritted her teeth. Him. He who had now stolen away half of her life. Taken her away with promises and gifts? She was angry, angry at herself but most of all angry at _him._

"No! Jeremy deserves something better than a cheating bastard to father!" she yelled.

Byron stood up. "Cheating? You think I am in love with you?" He took several steps closer to her until he was meeting her full on, his eyes staring into hers, fuming. "You're nothing but a whore."

Flor took a step back; he could've just as well slapped her. She was still not realizing what was happening. Somewhere in her mind she expected it to have been a mistake, that it was just one time thing. She didn't even have any real time. And now he'd called her a whore.

"You mean like your women?" she snapped back. She couldn't cry. She wouldn't cry.

"No," Byron said and his tone was calmer now, "I love one of them, her name's Bella."

"Love…" She hated how her voice shivered. "That's it… I…" She turned around from him, looking out the window again. Then she swung around again, and slapped him across the cheek.

He gritted his teeth and stared at her. His look so intent and angry that she thought he would hit her back. But he did nothing; he just walked away from her. Hesitating at the door.

"I'm leaving," Flor said before he left, "to a hotel. To figure things out."

Byron didn't say anything. He closed the door behind him and Flor could hear his steps fade away.

She collapsed on the floor, sobbing hard.

"Mum?" Flor looked up and saw her son stand in front of her, watching her seriously.

Flor sniffed. "Get your teddy bear honey, we're going away."

----

Margo took a deep breath and braced herself, like the words she was going to say would slam back at her face. "I'm going to tell the truth."

"Hurley, mind going away?" Wendy said and turned to him.

Hurley looked at both of them. "Oh I get it, girl talk right? I'll go."

After he left, Wendy gestured for Margo to sit down beside her. "What made you change your mind?"

"My stomach. And I don't mean like I had a bad feeling in the gut – which I do because of the morning sickness but… it's getting bigger. And it's kind of inevitable, right?"

"Right."

"And then when I took care – I and Zidler took care of Aaron, he was crying and crying and it was kind of crazy. But it was okay. And then when he stopped, and was so beautiful and still in his arms… Actually, I'm not that scared anymore." Margo bit her lip and looked at her with big eyes. "And Wendy… it wasn't fair to you." She laughed quietly. "I owe you like big time. So I'm gonna tell everyone tomorrow."

Wendy didn't need to say much, because there weren't much to say. "Hug?"

Margo smiled and hugged her. "Thank you." She pulled away from the hug, still smiling. "Good night."

"Night."

--

"Brian." It was a soft whisper, like a mother waking her child. He opened his eyes and found himself lying on soft grass. The sun blinded him and he rolled around away from it. It was a paradise, a garden, crimson and deep blue flowers were planted in a circle around him and he could see in the distance the sea from the hill he was lying on.

"Brian," spoke the same, serene voice again.

He struggled up on his feet, turned around and saw Rosalie stand outside the circle. She was smiling sadly, her hands closed together in a prayer and she wore a white gown with a red ribbon tied around her waist. "Brian."

"Rosalie?"

"You have lost your way Brian. You are spending too much time focusing on unimportant matters, look…" Her hands opened and in them she held the compass. "It is broken. But you don't need to fix it, not yet. You have more important matters to attend to."

"This is a dream." He took a few steps towards her, still inside the circle of flowers.

"That doesn't matter." She reached out a hand. "This matter, not the compass, but this…"

The compass turned to water, and before his eyes Brian saw them swirl and turn until it formed a question mark.

"You need to go to the question mark Brian."

He looked into her eyes and took another step forward. "Where is it?"

She smiled again. "You need to bring the compass."

"But – but where is it?"

"The one who will lead you to it is – No, Brian no!"

Brian gazed down, and realized he was outside the circle. He quickly took a step back, but it was too late. Rosalie screamed, the ribbon grew and twisted around her body and she went down on her knees by its force. The ribbon twined itself around Rosalie's throat. All he could hear was the sudden thunder of the sky, the drops that began to fell.

His eyes fluttered open and he sat quickly up, looking around in bewilderment.

"Where's the fire?" A cheeky voice said and Brian saw Owen, sit at the edge of his shelter.

"The – the question mark…"

Owen blinked and her hand curled into a fist and Brian saw a piece of paper in her closed hand.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he finally asked, still staring at her fist.

"Sawyer destroyed my tent," she said casually.

"And you decided to crash my place?"

"You are far more entertaining than the rest, it's so great to know that you're in love with Rosalie –"

"What?"

"You were talking about her, a lot."

Brian scowled at her but Owen just laughed. "Just wait until the whole camp hears it."

Brian wasn't much for hitting girls, but Owen didn't count as one of the female population in his mind. He whacked her arm.

"Hey!" Owen exclaimed and accidentally dropped the piece of paper on the ground. She reached out for it, bur Brian was faster and grabbed it.

He ignored her loud protests. "Now we can see what you're writing…" It was scribbling, a map, a question mark. His eyes widened in surprise. "Where did you –"

Owen snatched back the note from him and just glared, apparently at loss for words.

"Where did you see it?" he asked quickly.

Owen hesitated a moment before she said, "Not that it's any of your business; I saw it in the hatch."

"It's a map," Brian breathed.

"Oh really?" Owen raised an eyebrow in question, disbelief clear in her voice. "To me it's just gibberish."

"No, no it's not – Owen we have to go there."

Owen opened her mouth to say something, but a loud shriek interrupted them. Brian quickly stood up and with one look at each other they ran towards the source of the scream.

A group had already assembled and Owen looked around. "Who was it who screamed? Was it you?" she asked Bonnie to her right.

Bonnie looked offended. "I do not sound like that. It was Sean actually."

"Sean?" It was Jack; he looked like he'd just woken up, eyes dull and hair in a mess. "What's going on?"

Sean looked embarrassed, but he cleared his voice and tried to regain some sort of pride when he spoke, "The satellite phone is gone."

"Gone?" Jack turned around to face them. "Did someone take it?"

"Obviously, yes. Because it's not where I left it."

Lori bit her lip. "Maybe some of the kids wanted to play with it."

"You looking at me?" Ellie said in a very Ana-Lucia manner. Allen looked sheepishly at them, like he wanted to say 'It's not my fault you're a bad influence on her'.

"Please, calm down." Jack turned to Sean again. "Are you sure you left it there?"

"_Yes._"

"I can confirm it." Owen said. "Last time I saw the thing it was right there on the stub."

"Okay." Jack inhaled deeply. "Does anyone know where Naomi is?"

Sawyer, looking extremely irritated by the situation sighed and said, "Little miss Sheena is at the hatch."

--

"Oh."

Rosalie blinked and saw Flor stand by the trees. She held a yellow flower in her hand and with the other she pulled her hair back from her face.

"I-I didn't mean to interrupt…"

"No." Rosalie paused, "It's all right."

Florence looked down at the grave and at the cross. She slowly walked over to her side and put down her flower next to Rosalie's red one.

"A lot of things have happened since I left," she said quietly, still watching the grave. "Shannon –"

"Yes," Rosalie said simply, interrupting whatever Flor had been going to say. She went silent, tears welling up in her eyes that she furiously wiped away.

"I… I heard you got reunited with your wife," Flor said carefully and turned her tearful gaze to Rosalie.

Rosalie smiled faintly. "Yes. Yes I was. She's not here now though."

"Oh."

"Hey – Flor." Bonnie stopped abruptly. She was holding something that looked like a Dharma cookies box in her arms. Her eyes flickered back and forth between the two women.

"I'm gonna…" Flor pointed at the direction of the camp. Swallowed and simply walked away. Rosalie gazed after her, a slight frown on her face before she turned to Bonnie.

"A cookie?" Bonnie said warily.

"Sit," Rosalie said and her smile grew now real, a big grin that lightened up her face and the mood. Bonnie laughed quietly to herself and sat down on the sand next to her.

After a moment of silence Bonnie said, "I'm sorry."

Rosalie blinked and looked at her. "For what?"

Bonnie nodded at the grave. "I'm sorry I haven't been there for you. I just… I'm not good at this. And friends they should… you know. Be there for each other."

Rosalie inhaled deeply but didn't say anything. Her smile was gone and Bonnie couldn't read her expression. She wished she knew what Rosalie was thinking.

"I kind of missed you," she finally said. "A lot, actually."

Rosalie now grinned again and laughed. "I missed you too."

Bonnie joined her laugh, relieved. "Is this the part where we hug – or?"

Rosalie pulled her into a quick hug, smiling, glad to have her friend back again. There was something else she would like to say. Don't leave me. It felt stupid. But Lalita was already gone again. Sawyer was at the edge of going on another mission soon. And she just wanted to have someone around.

"You know what," she said as they parted from the hug, "let's have a girl's night out."

"Seriously?"

"Very seriously."

Bonnie shrugged but still smiled. "Sure, why not? I can go to the camp and get the food."

"And I'll go to the hatch and see if there's a spare tent or blankets or something there."

Bonnie raised an eyebrow. "Spare tent?"

Rosalie stood up on her feet and said cheerfully, "They got a lot of things down there!"

--

"Flor – Michael?" Jack had just gone into the jungle, to find the two of them running after him. Flor waving widely with her hands to catch his attention.

"You thought you could leave without us?" Michael said, panting.

"We want to see this hatch thing everyone talks about." Flor smiled. "And the whole doomsday deal sounds exciting too."

"We are not sure if it is actually of use…" Jack hesitated, "are you sure you want to come along? You know there is a prisoner down there?"

He saw a slight twitch in Flor's face. "Um... yeah, the prisoner…"

"Don't worry. He's locked up."

--

Flor jumped when the beeping sound first started. When it silenced her eyes were big in curiosity and she rushed to the computer room to talk with Locke.

Michael went with Jack, watching the kitchen and the stocks of records with fascination. Naomi was sitting in the sofa, an angry frown on her face even before Jack had explained to her what had happened.

Flor walked in looking frightened when she saw Jack and Naomi scream at each other. It ended with Jack stomping out of there, yelling something about never coming back.

Locke sighed, gave both of them an apologetic look and asked Flor if she could look after the button while he'd go and talk to Jack.

And he left.

"Who are you?" Naomi snapped and broke the silence.

Flor glanced at Michael. "Didn't Locke tell you? We were… um… we were taken captive by the Others."

"Ah, the natives. Like the one you got there." Naomi cocked her head at the locked door.

"Have you seen him?" Flor asked and sat down in the armchair, her eyes even wider now.

"Seen him?" Naomi chuckled darkly. "Yeah, I've seen him. See this?" She pointed a finger at her throat. "He made these bruises. Tried to strangle me."

Flor glanced at Michael again, but he was staring at Naomi. "Why would he do that? Why did you talk to him?"

Naomi sighed. "I was curious, all right."

"So you knew the code to the lock?" Michael asked with a light frown.

"16 right, 1 left and 24 right."

Now Michael's gaze locked with Flor's.

"Naomi," Flor said without looking at her, her voice shivering slightly, "do you want to go back to the camp? I know you're upset but maybe if you were there –"

BANG!

Flor screamed and put her hands on Naomi's chest, trying to stop the blood from pouring out of the bullet wound. Naomi croaked something incoherent. Florence's pleads useless to her as her head tilted to the side, and her heart stopped beating.

Flor's hands were shaking, blood dropped from her fingers and she turned to Michael. Tears streaming down her face and her voice choked up between her sobs when she said, "W-why?"

Michael's lips were in a thin line but there were guilt in his eyes. "Because we had to."

Flor turned her gaze to the dead woman again. She desperately tried to dry the blood off her hands on the couch before she closed her eyes. "Not like this," she whispered.

"She was dangerous," Michael said in a hysterical tone, all his calmness gone as the realization of what he'd done sank in. "You know she was Flor, you know she was here to kill us. Don't… don't look at me like that. We had to do this."

Flor swallowed and tried to keep her voice steady. "Give me the gun Michael."

"No!"

Flor stood up, her back still turned to him as she stared down at Naomi. "Give me the gun!"

"No!"

Flor swung around. She wasn't crying anymore. Just plain fury as she looked at Michael with disgust. "Give me the gun!" She clawed at his fingers, tried to bend his grip. He pushed her away but she came back again, now kicking and punching him as they fought over the control of the weapon.

A scream came from the entrance of the room. A shot rang out and the scream silenced immediately.

Flor and Michael stared at each other. Both of them were holding the gun and there was no way to know who'd fired it.

Florence let go of the grip and slowly turned around. Her expression terrified.

On the floor, lying in spasms Rosalie clutched at her stomach, trying to stop the blood.

Florence let out a scream of panic. She ran over to her side, her hands trembling as she tried to stop it too. But she knew it, as soon as the shot had been fired and she saw Rosalie on the ground that there was no stopping it.

"I'm so sorry," she cried, sobbing hard. "I'm so, so sorry."

Rosalie was still shaking, but not as much. She was lying on her back, her hair spread around her head almost in an angelic manner. Her eyes were big, more terrified than Flor's. Her lips parted and she tried to say something.

"What is it?" Flor clutched her hand, looking into Rosalie's eyes.

Rosalie whispered hoarsely, "The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want…" She silenced. Tried to wet her lips but unable to say anything more. She looked with pleading eyes at her.

"I'm sorry…" Flor said, sobbing again, "I don't know the rest."

Rosalie looked up at the ceiling again. Her body becoming eerily still and one word left her lips before her eyes glazed over and her heart beat it last beat. "Eva."

Florence buried her face in her arms and tried to gain control of her breathing. She looked up again and closed Rosalie's eyes gently. She hoped she had seen a memory, something happy. She hoped she'd seen her daughter.

----

"Hey it's..." Flor paused and smiled, "MJ." She laughed into the phone, and before she could stop herself, the laughter became hysterical and she began to sob uncontrollably. "So-so-sorry," she cried into the phone. "I-I… I miss you. Like a lot. Like really a lot. Like…" She was babbling now, she sniveled and dried the tears away.

"I and Byron had a fight. He's been cheating on me… and… I don't know. I don't know what to do. So I sort of need you right now, so… pick up the phone…" Flor waited a couple of seconds, then the answering machine cut her off and she dialed the number again.

"You better have a really good reason for not answering, and 'the new comic book got out' isn't a good one." She smiled again and sniffed. "I just took Jeremy and left. We're at a hotel in Sydney right now. I have to think things though you know? But… Byron said he loved one of the girls he cheated with. What do I make of that? We… we were supposed to get married… and I know listening to my voice must be tiring, but can you please just call me as soon as you get this… these messages? Okay, bye."

"Mummy?" Jeremy jumped up on the bed beside her. Flor pulled him closer to her.

"Yes?"

"If Dad's cheating you should just forgive him, I cheat on games too." His eyes and words were so innocent Flor almost began to cry again; instead she kissed the top of his head and blinked furiously to keep the tears from coming.

"It's not that simple." She knew it was lame.

"I wanna go home," he whined.

"We can go home tomorrow, but right now mummy has to figure some things out first okay?" Flor kissed him again and smiled weakly.

"Okay, but I don't wanna sleep here. I don't like this bed."

"That's," Flor said with laughter in her words, "why there's a perfectly good rug at the side of the bed."

Jeremy crinkled his nose. "I don't wanna sleep down there!"

Flor grinned. "It's either that or the bed."

Jeremy could practically fall asleep anywhere, anytime despite that he would sometimes fight about it. A trait that she shared with a certain other person Flor cared a great deal for. Flor herself couldn't fall asleep just as easy in the strange bed. It wasn't that it was uncomfortable, but her mind was occupied with panicking than to rest.

_Tomorrow,_ she thought, _tomorrow I'll talk with Byron and we'll sort things out. Everything's gonna be okay._ She closed her eyes and the world faded away.

She woke up startled, blinking and trying to understand what woke her up. Then she heard it, the door rustling, the slurry voices and then the door slammed open.

Flor sat up quickly and turned on the lamp on her nightstand. Blinking against the blur until she saw three forms in the doorway, three persons. "Byron?" she squeaked, then she yelled.

Her scream was silenced by one of the men who covered her mouth and roughly held her down on the bed. She tried to wriggle free, to reach her son.

The other guy, she recognized him – he was one of Byron's friends, took Jeremy up in his arms. Flor went mad; she tried to bite the hand covering her mouth and managed to kick the guy in the groin.

"Calm down!" Byron hissed furiously. "You don't wanna wake up Jeremy huh?"

"JERE –" Her scream was silenced when the guy closest hit her hard in the stomach. All air left her and she spluttered trying to call out for him. Tears sprung from her eyes. She saw the man leave with Jeremy.

"Stay still!" Byron shouted when she hit the guy. He pulled out a gun. "I said stay STILL!"

Flor sat back, panting heavily and staring at the weapon. Horror showing in her eyes. This couldn't be happening; Byron couldn't be pointing that gun at her. He couldn't. He said he _loved_ her. "N-no…"

"You can't' take my son away from me!" he snarled. "You can't take care of a child! You hate him! He's always in danger when he's with you. You can't take care of yourself! How can you think you can take care of a child?"

"Our son!" Flor cried. "Our… our son…"

"He's not your son!" Byron shouted, hi face red in anger. "He was never yours. Now I'm gonna be the one to raise him, me and his real mother."

"I'm…" Flor sobbed. "I'm his real mother…"

"No." Byron shook his head in disgust. "Bella is, and we're leaving for Portland and he's not gonna see you ever again." He nodded to the man at her side.

The man grabbed her hands and twisted them over her head.

"No! Help – HELP ME!" she screamed in protest as he tied her hands to the bedpost. She tried to kick him but Byron, still with a gun in his hand held her legs down. "They're taking my son! HE –"

She couldn't speak more as they gagged her. Leaving her hands bound above her head. She continued to try to get out of the knots, tears running down her face that she couldn't stop.

No, she protested in her head. They couldn't be doing this. Her son, they couldn't take her son. No, not Byron… Not the man who looked at her like she was the most beautiful person in the world. Not the man who didn't even blink when she told him about her pregnancy. Not the man who promised he would always, always take care of her.

They closed the door behind them. And Flor was left in the dark. One single thought on her mind:

To do whatever it takes to save her son.

----

"Where do you want it?" Michael asked silently.

Florence sat up, her hands on her knees. "On the shoulder…" she said without turning around. She closed her eyes, a tear pressing through and running down her cheek.

Michael fired the gun and Flor fell forward. He heard her wince in pain as he opened the lock to the door. He faced the man sitting on the bed, looking up at him with mouth open but did still not look surprised.

Michael pointed the gun at his own shoulder, and fired.

--

**Author's Notes:** As you might understand, this chapter was the hardest chapter I have ever written. Sorry for the long wait but I had to prepare myself for writing it. I was seriously a wreck.

And I got very good reasons for the long wait, for a first, it was hard to write it as I said above, then I lost my computer to viruses but managed to do a backup, so I tried to finish the chapter on another computer and that computer was ancient and couldn't handle my English and wanted me to write Swedish, ugh, and everything was horrible and then finally yesterday night I got my computer back!

But as a 'please forgive me' for the long wait I am planning something extra for the season six premiere day. Just saying.

Namaste.


	26. Hopes Are Dying

Though I turn, I fly not —  
I cannot depart;  
I would try, but try not  
To release my heart.  
And my hopes are dying  
While, on dreams relying,  
I am spelled by art.

_Thus, the bright snake coiling  
'Neath the forest tree  
Wins the bird, beguiling,  
To come down and see:  
Like that bird the lover  
Round his fate will hover  
Till the blow is over  
And he sinks — like me._

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 23 Part 1, Hopes Are Dying**

--

Another shot rang out. She flinched, but it hadn't been shot at her. She kept her eyes closed, but she heard how Michael winced – he'd shot himself.

Now he felt the pain she was feeling.

Someone touched her cheek, then her arm. Her eyes fluttered open. Above her she saw a man – bruises over his eyes and dried blood over his lips. It had to be him. The prisoner.

"Go," she snarled. He was the one responsible for everything. It was his fault they were here. That she was lying next to… to Rosalie, bleeding. She wished he was the one who was…

"Go!" she repeated.

"F-Florence?" the man stammered. "Rosalie?"

Flor's eyes narrowed even more. "Go…" They would be back soon. Wouldn't they? And they couldn't find them like this.

"Oh God…" he said, his round eyes getting bigger in shock by the second. "Oh, no, no, no." He touched her shoulder and Flor screamed out in pain. He grabbed her wrist instead.

"You have to believe me." He stared into her eyes. "I am so, so sorry."

Why was he saying this? Her head was spinning. All she wanted to let go of whatever was keeping her, holding her down from slipping into the darkness. And now he was confusing an already confused mind.

He let go of her arm and it dropped down on the floor. "I'm sorry Florence," he repeated.

"Go."

And finally he went.

----

Fire. It rained from the sky but unlike water drops they burned her.

She had dreamt this dream before.

The drops burned through her skin and made her writhe – scream and beg in pain. Beg until she gave up, gave up her life and wished to die. And then the fire would turn to ice, freeze her every bone, freeze her veins until they cracked and blood – cold blood would pour out from her body.

And then she would beg for mercy, and she would sell her soul, give them anything they wanted, give them her son, she didn't care. She just wanted it to be over.

She squirmed, clenched her fist and her eyes flew open. For one moment the fire was still burned inside her eyelids and she tried to blink it away, fight the nightmare off. Wake up.

Flor's shoulder ached in pain and she sat violently up. She got dizzy and lay down on the floor again, grimacing and trying to get the nausea to disappear.

Finally she could sit up and she rested her head in the corner of the small room. She looked at her arm. Her skin was sore and she saw a band-aid, she tore it away. They'd injected her. Her pulse fastened. They'd stuck a needle in her!

She looked around the room again and saw that it was empty, no windows, just plain grey walls… except for...

She crawled over the floor, her legs hurt. She grabbed the bottle at the other end of the room. It was filled with water. She was thirsty, really thirsty like she hadn't had water for days.

Flor wanted to taste it, drink it but she stopped herself. She had been taken, imprisoned. The water could be poisoned so she put it away.

Where was Walt? She remembered him screaming by her side as the raft went up in flames. Michael, Jin and Lori… they'd been on it. Had they died? They couldn't have.

She felt the tears well up in her eyes but the brushed them away. At least she knew for sure Walt had been taken too. It was the only thing she knew. And it wasn't a fact she wanted to be true. Most of all she wanted the kid to be safe.

She stood up, and did like she'd seen all those people do in the movies. Knock on the wall. Touch it. Seek after an escape or a loose brick. Not that the wall was made of bricks. She squinted up at the light. It was too far away for her to reach. They had _electricity._

The door creaked and Flor stumbled backwards, back to the wall furthest away. A woman stood in the doorway. The same woman who'd kidnapped her and Walt. Only she didn't have brown hair anymore, she had blonde, but those eyes – piercing into hers like ice – she couldn't forget them.

"Why haven't you drunk any?"

"What?" Flor croaked in a less angry manner than she intended.

The woman nodded at the water bottle on the floor. "You must be really thirsty."

Flor didn't answer. She just stared with pure defiance.

"Oh well." The woman sighed. She took the cork off and took a sip. "See? Not poisonous".

Flor's lips were dry and her whole body was shivering from want, want of water and the thirst. She closed her eyes. Her throat hurt, it was hoarse and she needed it. She opened her eyes again and gave in, drinking greedily from the bottle until it was finished. She still wanted more.

"Good," the woman said with a pleased smile and Flor felt weak, so weak for giving in and being human. "But you should have saved some."

Flor's eyes widened. She wanted more and she let out a sigh of relief as the woman handed her the thing behind her back, another water bottle.

"Save it."

Florence scooted back so her she was leaning against the wall behind her. "Who are you?"

"My name is Juliet." The woman barely blinked and kept her gaze on Flor. It made her uncomfortable. But she still felt better now when she'd gotten the water.

"Where's Walt?" she asked in a weak voice that was meant to be strong.

"He's somewhere nice, nicer than this, I can promise you that."

Flor swallowed and it hurt. "Why…" It was all she could muster in this moment. She felt so tired but still it felt like she was going to explode with rage and questions but she was still so exhausted.

"You wonder why you are here."

Flor nodded, her hair fell in her face and irritated she pulled it back behind her ears.

"You are here Florence because we want to stop you."

And now Flor met her gaze and kept it there, mouth open in surprise. "W-why?"

"Because you Florence, will do many bad things." The woman finally blinked, but it only made her seem even more frightening. "You will do horrid deeds."

"I… I…" What did you say to that?

"There are many different people. There are good people, bad people and special people. Bad people like Dominic in your camp, good people like Claire and special people like Walt. But what makes Walt even more special, is that he is a good person too. But you know what you are?"

Flor shook her head, still staring into the woman's eyes.

"You are special, but you're also a bad person, and that makes you very dangerous. And the things you are going to do Flor… If you had the chance, to go back in time and kill a murderer, wouldn't you do it?" She smiled sadly.

"You are crazy," Flor whispered. "You are insane. You… you blew up the raft… Where's Walt?"

"He's somewhere safe."

They stared at each other. The woman's gaze so… expressionless.

"I'm sorry," the woman finally said, "I didn't introduce myself. My name is Juliet."

"I don't care what your freaking name is!" Flor shouted. "You can't just kidnap people! Where is he? If he's hurt I swear I will –"

"Be grateful that you are still alive Flor," Juliet snapped. "Believe me there are many people that want you dead here." She stood up and looked down at her. "I will be back, and we'll talk some more. I'm not the enemy Flor, I want to help you, please understand that."

"Where's Walt?" Flor yelled, furious.

Juliet walked out of the room, a hand on the door and she looked at her again, as to say something. Flor was suddenly completely silent.

But then she just shook her head and closed the door.

----

Only a minute after Michael stumbled out of the room to get help Jack was at her side.

"S-sorry." Flor whimpered.

Jack looked right into her eyes. A pitying, sort of look he must have given to many of his patients. "It's not your fault."

"I have to l-let go."

And she did.

It was in the end a relief actually.

--

At the camp, people were blissfully unaware that one of them was dead, and the person supposed to rescue them was too.

Instead, some people were looking for the satellite phone, without even knowing that the person who brought it there had been shot in the chest by one of them.

By one of the shelters a man stood, wondering where the girl he'd kissed was. He didn't know that she was in a hatch, a bullet in her shoulder and her blood tainted with murder.

None of them knew anything, not yet, and still one of these blissfully unaware people knew too much.

Owen yawned, she'd been kept up way too long and she really, really wanted to sleep. But the survivors liked to hammer at stuff, so unfortunately the rest of the camp had to suffer a sleep-deprived Owen. It was their fault really.

And then there was Brian. Good old might-be-a-Zombie-Brian. Who enjoyed stalking her.

That was something she should be used to, being a rock star and all. But the last time she had a stalker – it hadn't ended well. She bit her lip at the memory, almost drawing blood.

But she didn't think of those memories anymore, no, she locked them up in a box far, far away in her mind and then burned it.

"What the hell do you want Haligan?" she finally snapped.

Brian stepped out of his hiding spot behind Aaron's crib. "The question mark."

She sighed. "Is what we all look like when Fox talks – but what does it have to do with me?"

"You _know_ where it is."

Okay, what was it Libby had said when she talked with her? Something about anger managements. Count to ten. One… two… three… four… Bloody hell. He was talking about a question mark.

"You," she said and pointed a finger at him, "are crazy."

"No..." Brian hurried to her side. "Look at this."

"A compass. A broken compass. Nice. See you later –"

"No, it leads somewhere and I have to go there."

"So _go there._" Owen had very little patience with the guy. For all she cared he could've gone with Boone and stayed gone. It was like he made her act like her worst all the time he was near.

But he was just so bloody irritating.

"It's not that simple. You have to come with me."

"Why?"

Brian opened his mouth – but no words came out, he opened his mouth again, and it was a bit funny to watch. Finally he said, "I will let you hear what Fox translates in the logbook if you come with me."

"Curiosity killed the cat," Owen said to herself. "But that's not enough. I want you to be on my side of the war."

Brian frowned in confusion. "War?"

"Yeah, me against Sawyer. Where have you been? Soon the camp's gonna split into two parts – and oh, I need your help to convince Fox to join us. He seemed really weird when I talked to him earlier."

"Yeah, I think Sawyer's blackmailing him for something."

Owen pursed her lips. "Of course he is, that idiot," she muttered. "And also, if we're going on another suicide mission or whatever looking for a damn question mark, I want Wendy with us."

"But she's pregnant."

Owen rolled her eyes. "So?

--

"It hurts, it hurts!" Flor whined. She closed her eyes, bit her lip and prepared herself for the more pain to come. She groaned and then yelled, fluttering her eyes open and staring with pain at the bullet in Jack's hand.

"Lay down," Jack told her and she obliged, careful not to hurt her shoulder – which failed as she once again winced.

"Rosalie? She's still…" Jack looked down. Flor didn't know she'd said Rosalie's name. She didn't know anything. Everything just hurt. He should help Rosalie. He shouldn't be with her. She didn't deserve it. Why did he look at her like that? Sad eyes – _pitying._ Rosalie.

Rosalie dead. Rosalie on the floor with her eyes unseeing. Rosalie with red and red and red. _Eva._

"I'm so sorry." Tears fell down her face. "I… I…"

"Hush." Jack looked over his shoulder at something. Flor blinked and saw Michael, he was blurry. There was something white on his shoulder too.

"Rosalie…" Flor said again, almost pleadingly while she looked at Michael.

"Jack, go," Michael said simply.

"She's confused –"

"I know. I can explain. You don't have to."

"Okay… Flor." Jack turned his face to hers again. "You're going to be okay, you hear me?"

Flor shook her head and whispered, "No, I'm not."

She didn't know if he'd heard her. He left her side and Michael sat down on the chair beside the bed she was lying on. She didn't know what to make of his expression, it looked like he was trying to be calm, but inside there was a storm emotions. She felt so much guilt.

"Rosalie's dead."

_I know. _"She can't be."

"She is." Michael inhaled a shivering breath. "She wasn't supposed to be – but she is. And now we have to do what we can. You know, whatever it takes right?"

"I don't wanna." She sounded like her son when he was whining, but she didn't want to, not now. She couldn't.

Michael leaned closer. "We have to. You know we have to. We have to for their sake!"

Flor whined and closed her eyes again, she had to stop crying. "I… I know."

"Good, get your strength back. You still have the list?"

Flor nodded weakly. "It's in my pocket."

----

"Here!" Juliet's lips were barely curled up in a smile as she put down the tray before her.

Flor frowned at the sight of the food. Juliet sighed and took a sip of the soup.

"See?" she said. "It's not poisonous. Eat up."

For took up the spoon and hesitated, then she carefully swallowed a mouthful of the soup. It felt amazing and she was so hungry. She knew she must look awful, and it probably wasn't good for some health-related reason to eat so fast – but she couldn't help herself.

After she was finished she drank from the water, even though Juliet hadn't drunken from it first.

"Where's Walt?" Flor asked after she'd swallowed.

Juliet sighed like always. "He's safe. Now, I need you to give me your arm."

Flor raised her eyebrows. "What?"

Juliet took out a syringe. "I need some of your blood."

She swallowed again at the sight of it. "Haven't you taken enough?"

"Sorry, no we haven't. One of our people accidentally spilled out some of your blood." Juliet laughed to herself. "Oh, that's a strange thing to say."

"Why do you want my blood anyway?" Flor stared at the needle piercing her arm and grimaced.

Juliet smiled widely. "To drink it."

Juliet but a band-aid on and Flor watched a small red dot spread on it. "I wouldn't be surprised if that was true actually."

Juliet took up the tray again and walked to the door.

"Is that it?" Flor shouted after her.

Juliet turned around, looking a bit stunned. "What do you mean?"

"You are just keeping me here day and night… what are you going to do with me? Why am I here?"

"You know –"

"Yes, I heard all about the 'horrid things' I'm supposed to do. But why are you keeping me in here all the time? What is the reason? If you want me gone why don't you just take a gun –"

"Don't talk like that!" Juliet roared.

Flor's eyes widened in surprise. Juliet's hands were white around the tray and she was trembling.

"The reason we're keeping you in here without doing anything is because we are arguing on whether or not to kill you!"

Flor stared at Juliet and whispered, "Oh."

It didn't look like Juliet heard her. "I am on the side that wants you to live, Florence! And I am doing everything I can to stop them from barging in here and… and to take a gun and point it at your head. But if they win, then all those days and nights will go away and you don't have to suffer from boredom. Please, be grateful you're alive!"

"So if they don't kill me… You're gonna keep me in here forever right?"

"I'm sorry… But yes."

----

Wendy pondered on whether she would actually need a spare shirt when a shadow was cast over her packing. She looked up and saw Bonnie stand in front of her, carrying a backpack of her own.

"I heard you were going on some mission with Owen and Brian."

Wendy blinked a few times and then looked down. "Yeah, I thought it was a secret mission though."

"Owen is a real gossip, you shouldn't tell her anything."

"Okay," Wendy simply said, waiting for whatever it was Bonnie really wanted to say.

"What the hell Wendy? You're pregnant!" Bonnie finally spat.

Wendy stood up and met Bonnie's gaze. "Newsflash, I'm not an invalid. I'm going, I need to get out!"

"You can't –"

"Bonnie? Wendy?" a weak voice said. Wendy glanced at Margo who looked a bit frightened at the sight of them.

"What is it?" She didn't mean to sound so snappish, but she was fuming.

"Can – can I talk to you? It's kind of urgent."

Bonnie looked like she was having an inner turmoil and in the end she sighed. "Be careful." She left, but glanced over her shoulder at Wendy from time to time.

Margo sat down in the double passenger seat. "I don't think you should go either."

Wendy frowned. "I'm not pregnant. You of all people know that."

"Yes… it's just… I'm going to tell everyone today. And it would go a lot better if you were with me. I can't tell the truth without you…"

"Can't you do it now?"

Margo looked down and bit her lip. "I haven't told Zidler."

"Then you can tell when I come back."

Margo sighed but didn't argue. "What's so important about this… mission thing?"

Wendy didn't know if she could really explain it, she just couldn't sit around; she needed to go away, if only for a little while. And Owen had been really persistent even though Brian had looked murderous at the thought of her tagging along. She wasn't even sure what the whole mission thing was about. "I just… I have to go."

"Okay," Margo mumbled.

"Take care of little Wendy junior for me right?" Wendy smiled; she didn't like it when Margo looked so damn sad, anything but sad was good.

As she predicted Margo's expression went from solemn to horrified. "Wendy junior?"

"Yeah, duh, after all I've done for you naming the kid after me is the least you can do." Wendy laughed.

--

"You are such an idiot!"

"Hey to you t-too Owen." Fox was used to Owen being… well, the only word for it was _Owen-ish._ But as he looked up and met her gaze, he saw that she really was furious. Her eyes were blazing and her knuckles were white as she held them in closed in fists. "Um…"

Owen hit him over the head and Fox winced. "You are the _biggest _idiot of a person I've ever met! Ugh, can't you keep out of trouble for one second? Seriously! You are like a magnet!" She pointed and angry finger at his chest. "You should've told me Sawyer knew… knew about the whole setting fire to shelters thing you got going on!"

Fox's face was pale in shock and he stared at her with wide eyes. "You – you knew?"

Owen rolled her eyes. "_Duh,_ of course I knew! I'm not an idiot like you. Fox, I know everything you; you should know that as an Other. But back to the point, was Sawyer the one to abuse you?"

Fox was just staring, still too stunned to speak coherently and Owen grabbed his shoulder. "Fox! Was he the one to give you all the bruises?"

Fox shook his head. "E-ethan."

Owen sighed, still holding him. "Brilliant. The simplest order of all of them, _keep Fox safe._ And now you've gotten yourself in so much trouble." She was talking to herself, her eyes looking past him. "I have to do it, no other way."

"O-other w-way what?" Fox stammered and got her attention back.

"Did Sawyer threaten to tell the whole camp you set Claire's shelter to fire if you didn't do what he said?"

Fox nodded weakly.

"Okay then. I'm going on a mission with crazy Brian and knocked-up Wendy." Owen looked directly into his eyes. "And when I return, I'm going to tell everyone that it was I who set the shelter to fire okay? And you're not going to say a thing. Give Sawyer all the alcohol and he'll be too drunk for anyone to believe him when he disagrees, okay? Is that clear enough for you to understand?"

"H-how did y-you know?"

Owen let go of his shoulders and smiled wickedly. "You don't think the Others let me go just like that did ya? See you later Foxy."

Fox gaped after her as she joined Brian and Wendy by the water supply. They walked into the jungle, Brian looking around suspiciously, Wendy waving goodbye to Hurley, Owen – she didn't look back.

_Get Sawyer drunk. _Fox saw Sawyer stagger around, following a very annoyed Kim around. That should be relatively easy.

--

Rosalie's body was covered with a blanket, beside hers Naomi lay too, there the blanket had gone down a bit, showing the top of her head.

Michael stared at it as he rubbed the floor with the towel. The bucket of water beside him was red from the wiped up blood. Form the other room he heard Jack and Locke argue, until Locke stepped on one crutch past him.

"I'm going to the beach to get help," he told him before he went into the corridor. Jack entered the room after him, narrow eyes watching the bodies. Michael guessed Jack had wanted to go after the man in the prison, but had to stay because of Flor.

From the other room, he heard her whine and wince. Maybe she was asleep. Maybe she was having a nightmare.

Michael was awake, and he still had them.

"Michael," Jack said without looking at him, his gaze still fixated on the bodies, "do you know where their camp is?"

"Yes."

"If you could – would you lead us to them?" Jack looked down at him.

Michael met his gaze. "Of course."

--

"BRIAN! We found it!"

Brian whirled around and rushed through the trees over to Owen and Wendy.

"Where?" he breathed.

Wendy pointed to the ground, a hand over her mouth.

There in the dirt they'd drawn a question mark.

"Very funny." Brian turned around and behind him Owen and Wendy were laughing hysterically at him.

"Oh, cheer up!" Owen said cheerfully.

Wendy tilted her head to the side. "It was only a joke."

"Yeah, haha, very funny." Brian looked down at the compass again.

"Let me have a look at that." Wendy grabbed it from his hands. "Huh, I think it's pointing at the hatch."

"Where I saw the question mark, guess this will be a short trip," said Owen with a sigh.

"It's not pointing at the hatch!" Brian argued.

Wendy raised an eyebrow and looked kindly at him. "Brian, it sort of does."

Brian muttered something inappropriate under his breath. "Let's just go on."

"_The show must go on…!_" Owen started to sing.

Brian groaned.

--

Margo took a deep breath and walked over to Zidler, he was sitting at the outskirt of the camp, playing with his cards like usual. She smiled a little but then bit her lip.

This was it.

"Zidler."

"Yeah?" He didn't even look up. His face was pinched in concentration at whatever he was doing with the cards.

Maybe it would be easier if he wasn't looking at her. "I got something to tell you. And you have to be serious because it is… very serious."

"All right." Zidler sounded a bit amused, but he still didn't meet her gaze.

"I mean it! You can't joke or smile or laugh or get mad, don't get mad all right!"

"Okay."

"And you can't freak out or stomp your foot in the ground or even change your face the least bit! Don't even breathe!"

"Sure."

"Don't say anything either!"

"All right."

"I TOLD YOU NOT TO SAY ANYTHING!"

--

"Sean!" Locke shouted.

Sean was currently busy glaring at everyone and everything, but at Locke's shout he turned around. "Locke, what is it?"

"There's a problem at the hatch," Locke said in a low tone, looking around like he was afraid of anyone overhearing them.

"What kind of problem?" Sean asked slowly.

"The man in the hatch, he escaped."

Sean's eyes were wide. "Escaped?"

Locke nodded. "A lot of things happened. Can you get Dom and Bonnie to come with us? We have to keep this quiet right now."

Sean nodded. "Sure, sure. I'll go get them."

"LOCKE!"

Bonnie rushed over to them. Her face a bit flustered but her blue eyes big and shining. Sean hadn't seen her look so good in weeks. "Locke, hey, were you at the hatch?"

"Yes," Locke answered warily.

"Did you see Rosalie there?" Bonnie breathed. "She was just supposed to get some things… What, what is it?" she asked, noticing the grave expression on his face.

Locke looked down. "Sean, can you get Dom?"

Sean nodded and left. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that Locke had put a hand on Bonnie's shoulder. Only a second afterwards she collapsed on the ground, burying her face in her hands.

--

Michael stared at the list, at the names. They didn't need this now. He picked up a lighter from his pocket and burned it, watched the edge of the paper curl and turn to ash, the names disappearing to never be read again.

"Michael?" He turned around and saw Jack come out from the hatch.

"Yeah?" He hid the lighter and hoped Jack hadn't seen.

"Flor's awake."

When he entered the hatch again, Flor was leaning against the wall. She stared with an intense gaze on the two bodies and didn't even acknowledge their presence.

"Flor, maybe you should lie down –"

"I'm okay," Flor quickly said and looked up, looking a bit dazed. "Really, I'm fine actually."

Jack looked like he wanted to argue with her. But he didn't have the chance to when Sean, Dom and Bonnie barged into the room.

Bonnie yelped. She took a few steps back, almost collapsing again. "No…" she whispered and knelt down, her hands trembling so much she almost couldn't get a grip around the blanket. She pulled it away, just enough for Rosalie's lifeless face to show. "Oh God, _no._"

Dom swallowed. "Locke – who by the way looks a lot like that guy in _The Stepfather_ – is right behind us." His voice shivered a little.

"Flor!" Sean hurried to her side, looking at her shoulder in shock. "Are you okay?"

Flor gave him an almost disgusted look. "Of course I'm not okay! How can you…"

She shook her head and stormed out of the room.

Bonnie was sobbing, Dom looked like he didn't know what to do, Jack just watched.

Michael ran after her but was stopped by Locke just by the entrance.

"Michael," he said, "I know this isn't a good time…" He looked over his shoulder, just where Flor had rushed off. "But do you know anything about the direction the man might have taken?"

"No… no, I'm sorry, man. But I gotta…" Michael walked past him and out off the hatch. It was easy to find Flor. She was just hiding inside the trees, sitting on a rock sobbing loudly.

"She's not supposed to be dead!" she shouted without looking at him.

Michael sighed. He sat down beside her. "I know. But we just gotta do it anyway."

"They said all of them! We can't take them all… Not now."

"Well we're still gonna do it! Maybe they'll understand… Flor, we have to think about… I have to do this for Walt. Even if… it's not all right now."

"What if they punish us?" Flor whispered.

"They won't. They promised."

"Did you burn the list?" she asked.

"Yes," Michael replied with a sigh. "I burned it."

"There's one name there that… it isn't gonna be easy to take him with us."

"I know." Michael stared at the trees. "I got a plan."

"A plan?" Flor whispered.

"Yeah, you go back into the hatch and you gotta stop them from leaving, organize the rescue instead. And I'm gonna go to the beach."

"You're not… going to do something stupid are you? Michael…"

"Don't worry, I won't."

Flor took a deep breath and stood up. "Okay. Let's get started."

----

"What…"

Flor blinked and fought against the hands pulling, dragging at her body. "Stop!" she yelled.

The light was turned on, and by the door Juliet stood. Two people were holding Flor steady, hard in their grip.

"I'm sorry Florence." Juliet nodded at the two men and they forced her to walk after her.

"Stop…" she argued weakly. They dragged her out in a corridor. Dim lights shone above her head and the whole place had a musty smell. She got the feeling that she was underground.

She tried to remember the way. In case she would escape. But it was like a maze. She looked everywhere, her eyes trailing across the walls and into the rooms. Once, she even thought she saw a room with a shark hanging upside down. But mostly there were just storages.

They didn't say a word. And their faces weren't very special. Actually, they looked very similar. No, they looked exactly the same. Flor realized that the two men dragging her between them were twins. They had the same light brown hair, small brown eyes and narrow lips.

_Or maybe they are clones,_ she thought.

They dragged her up a staircase. When they opened the door at the end of it, Flor was struck by the bright light from the sun and the smell from the jungle. Shocked, she squinted up at the sky and turned her head to see as much as possible.

She inhaled deeply to get so much fresh air as she could, and was in a ruse of finally being outside she barely noticed where they went – until she was strolling down a walkway with a canopy above towards one single door at the end.

"What's in there?" she asked in a hurried voice. They all ignored her. Juliet didn't even turn around. "I asked you what's in there!"

Juliet pulled the door open and finally looked at Flor. There was a trace of guilt in her eyes but it disappeared as she turned her gaze to the twins. She went in before them and they followed after, now letting go of her but still walking so close she couldn't do anything else than follow their lead.

Flor gasped in surprise. It was a big room. Many rows of seats were lined up before a lectern on the opposite end of the room. There was a weird logo on the wall behind – an octagon. The seats were almost filled, and the people sitting in them wore regular clothes unlike the twins by her side and Juliet. They were whispering, talking, laughing but as they noticed her entrance they faded into silence.

She could see them all looking at her, some with interest, surprise – and some with hatred. She swallowed and looked down at the floor.

She wasn't surprised when the twins abandoned her side just when they came to the stairs. Juliet had walked up before her on the lectern and she knew she was supposed to do the same.

She wondered what would happen if the just ran for it. Darted to the door and didn't look back.

She looked out at the crowd. Their normal faces. Their normal clothes. These were the Others. These were the people who kidnapped Owen and Claire. Kidnapped her and Walt. And now they were looking at her like she was a caged lion in a circus. Intrigued, but never liking.

She took another shivering breath and walked up the couple of stairs. With her head held high she sat down on the chair on the left side of the lectern. On the other side, there were three other chairs. On one of them Juliet sat, her ice blue eyes fixated on the wall and beside her was a blonde woman. Her face was older than Juliet's and far smugger when she stared at Flor.

Flor waited and tried to keep calm. But she had never been more nervous in her life.

Finally, a man came up from the other side of the stage. He had very dark eyes and lashes. His hair short and his lavender shirt tucked inside his jeans. With the way everyone looked at him, they respected him a great deal.

"Well then," he said as he sat down, "let's get started shall we?"

The smug blonde woman took up a paper she had in her lap and read from it loud, "Florence Bluth, is that you?"

Everyone knew that was her name. Her heart pounded hard in her chest. What the hell was going on?

"Yes," she replied, failing at trying to keep her voice steady. "That's my name."

"Florence Bluth, you are here on a trial to determine whether or not you should be executed. Your attorney, Juliet has filled you in on the details yes?"

"EXECUTED?"

She heard some of the people in the rows start to whisper furiously. No one told them to be silent.

"Surely, your attorney told you all of this?"

"No... not really."

"Juliet." The smug woman turned to her. "Is that true?"

"I have filled her in." Juliet looked very irritated. "But Florence doesn't understand."

"Florence Bluth." _Why do they keep saying my name? She thought._ "Do you know that you are here on trial because of the fact that you have… are going to do horrid deeds?"

"Going to?" Flor snapped. "Going to do horrid deeds? I thought you could only put people on trial of what they've done… I have done nothing! And unless you people can see the future you have no evidence. And really, I would never do something… _horrible,_ right."

Someone chuckled, another one laughed.

"Oh, dear." The smug woman said. "But we do have evidence."

"Where? Shouldn't you show it to me?"

"No!" It wasn't the smug woman. It was the man by her side. "She can't see it. And she shouldn't be speaking."

"Why not Richard?" The smug woman said and chuckled. "It's not like her words will do much difference. And isn't that the reason we brought her here?" She turned to the crowd. "To let her speak?"

More people laughed and smiled at her words. Flor felt tears well up in her eyes but she blinked them away. These things belonged in nightmares; crazy people like these shouldn't exist. Nothing she would say would make a difference. They actually thought she was going to do something awful. And they wanted to execute her.

"That's enough!"

Flor didn't think she would ever be glad to hear Juliet talk, but she was. The crowd went silent as Juliet stood up.

"This woman," Juliet pointed at Flor, "has been brought here, to us. Not to become a part of our community. Not because she is special. Not because she is pregnant. Not to help us in any way. The only reason she is here, is because some of us believe that she will do something horrible in the future, and they don' even know what!" she spat the last words, glaring at the smug blonde woman.

"She eats our food. She wears our clothes. She drinks our water." Juliet shrugged but her gaze was cold as ice. "It's useless really. So… in the very own words of our sheriff." She looked again at the smug woman. "Why don't we just put her out of her misery?"

Flor couldn't help herself. She hissed, "You can't!"

"Yes!" Juliet pointed at her again. "We can't! We are not animals. We are not savages. Are we really going to kill a woman, just because someone has said that she's bad? Then, why don't we go and take James Ford? He who shot an innocent man. He has done _something._ Instead, we're wasting our time, deciding the fate of Florence Bluth. She's nothing. She's never done anything remarkable. Isn't going to do anything out of the ordinary. And most importantly… Jacob hasn't said we should murder her."

"It's called execute!" the sheriff yelled, but her words were only heard by the closest to her. The people in the seats were in uproar. Talking and shouting at each other, at the Sheriff, at Juliet.

"SILENCE!"

Flor almost fell of her seat at the roar coming from the man – Richard. He stood up, hands raised at the crowd. "Juliet," he lowered his hands, "will you take her away?"

"Of course," Juliet said in a monotone voice. But when she took Flor's arm, she saw the ghost of a smile on her lips as she led her down the podium and beside all the people.

Behind her the people were discussing her fate, and now she couldn't defend herself.

Juliet closed the door behind them and let go of Flor's arm and then she smiled widely.

"I don't think they're going to kill you. I think we've won!" Her laughter was so different, maybe even beautiful, because now it was a real laugh, a real smile.

Flor was so shocked she only just stood there. There was no one else around but them. "Oh… um…"

"Don't worry." Juliet took her arm again, but not hard, just enough for Flor to walk with her down the corridor. "Everything's gonna be fine."

There were a million things she wanted to ask. But it was only one thing that she managed to say, "Can I see Walt?"

Juliet stopped, glanced over her shoulder and then smiled again. "Of course."

----

"I told you it didn't lead to the hatch!" Brian smirked.

Wendy sighed. _"I know."_

The compass had pointed near the hatch, but not at the hatch. She had wistfully wanted to go in there but they'd walked right past it. Now they were still in the endless jungle.

Owen frowned. "Do you hear water?"

"It's not raining…"

"Thank you Miss Obvious," Owen said. "But seriously, it sounds like water."

"I want water…" Wendy looked wishfully at the backpack she'd carried, but now was in Owen's possessions. She'd said that pregnant women shouldn't carry much weight, and now she refused to share anything of her own packing and Wendy's. She said it was in case they got lost. Wendy thought she was just being mean.

Owen picked up her pace so she was in front of the two of them. "I swear I can hear…"

"Slow down!" Wendy shouted as Owen rushed between the trees, the thick vegetation blocking her from view.

Brian looked down at the little note Owen had given him earlier. "Huh," he said.

"'Huh' what?" Wendy walked faster, trying to catch up to Owen.

"I think… I think this is the hatch… which means… that there's some sort of water over there!"

They glanced at each other – and set off in a run. Owen was shouting something in the distance, and soon the trees cleared and they were at the edge of the stream.

The water ran quickly, and loudly. It wasn't deep as they could see the bottom of it; it probably would only reach up to their waists as the highest.

On the other side of the stream there were giant rocks that evolved into a hill.

Owen grinned and dipped her feet in the water. "Told ya!"

"Cool!" Wendy also put her feet in the water. She breathed out slowly, letting her feet cool down.

"And what's even cooler…" Brian held the compass high. "Is that the compass is pointing right there." He pointed at the rocks.

"Brian, darling," Owen said sarcastically, "are you saying we are going _into_ the hill?"

Brian smirked in response and stepped into the water.

"Idiot!" Owen shouted. "You could like… _slip._"

"I came back from the dead. Do you think this can stop me?"

"A confession!" Wendy said dramatically. But she knew Brian was only joking.

Owen gave her a look that said 'what now?' at Brian walking through the stream over to the rocks.

Wendy shrugged in response and carefully stepped into the water. Her body immediately felt heavy, and the bottom was muddy and it was hard to take steps. She struggled to come up beside Brian, but he was much faster and was already at the end.

To her irritation, Owen rushed past her, unaffected by the water and waved at her when she was at the rocks.

Wendy growled but finally, she managed to get to the other side. Owen helped her up on the rock and they were both careful not to slip. Brian had already disappeared into the hill.

It hadn't been visible from the outside, but as you took a few steps in between the two big rocks there was a sharp turn to the right and then into the hill. But then Wendy saw sunlight, and in confusion they both walked towards it.

The roof above them was made of la canopy of leaves and twigs, covering a long pathway leading to a door at the end. Brian stood by the door, smiling smugly.

"Wow," Wendy breathed, "just… wow."

"Maybe you're not completely crazy, but I still don't see anything resembling a question mark," Owen said when they reached up to his side.

Brian's grin looked like it would almost break his face, it was that big. "There's still the mystery door."

"So open it then." Wendy nodded at it.

Brian shifted awkwardly and the smile disappeared from his face. "Um… yeah."

Owen arched an eyebrow and smiled. "You are still not opening it."

"Okay." Brian pulled the door open. They all peered inside.

"Anyone of you got a flashlight?" Wendy asked. It was complete darkness inside, but they could all hear small drops of water.

Brian grimaced. Complete darkness was never something good. "Ladies first."

Owen smiled innocently and looked at Brian. "After you then!"

In the end, after a lot of quarrelling – it was Wendy who went first. She carefully walked inside the hill, as she touched the wall on her side it was wet and she realized that the ground was sloping down.

"You know what? I think this mission ends here," Owen squeaked when she too noticed that they were going deeper. "We should go back."

Wendy said, "But it's _fascinating._" And it was. She did have a bad feeling in her gut though – but the overall excitement of finding a secret entrance through a waterfall and then this whole construction thing – they just couldn't turn back now.

"I think the tunnel's about to end," said Brian.

"And what gives you that scientific conclusion?" Owen snapped. "We should just go back okay_, my hair is wet._"

"There's a light, coming from there." And a weird, sounding buzzing noise. Wendy suddenly had a weird idea of what might be at the end; she'd heard that sound before.

"Ooh," Owen said, now she suddenly sounded intrigued, "you think it's the light at the end of the tunnel? That would be a _fantastic._"

The tunnel suddenly took a sharp turn to the left and they all ran only to stop in their tracks. Faces dumbfounded and mouths hanging open at the sight before them.

"This… does not look like a question mark," Owen said breathless.

It did not look a question mark. It was two giant, _coils things, _Wendy decided. That were almost on the side in the middle of the – well, it looked a lot like the computer room at the hatch. Minus the computer of course, and minus everything really. It was just the strange roof that was the same.

Beside the weird coils laid tons of severely damaged equipment. Some of them were covered in some sort of frozen blue liquid, just like the coils. And the buzzing noise was even louder now, and there was also the sound of sparks from the heart of the two coils.

"The compass, it's pointing directly at this." Brian circled around it, carefully stepping over all the broken equipment.

"Guys!" Wendy shouted, her eyes flickering nervously from the weird reactor – coil things – to them. "There's a computer – a working computer here."

Brian ignored her call, but Owen managed to get to her side. She stared at the dark screen intently for a few seconds before she looked at Wendy. In a drawn out voice she said, "And?"

Wendy bit her lip and didn't answer. She was staring at the screen, pressing down the buttons on the keyboard. Nothing happened. She continued to just press them, and Owen sighed, leaving her to it. She could hear them speak in low voices, not angry, just speaking. That was a strange phenomenon, but this place – Wendy glanced up, this place was different.

When she turned her gaze back to the computer screen – there were the familiar green colors and three options.

**Send a ping**

**Check station status**

**Neutralize reactor **

"Guys!" she shouted again.

Owen and Brian hurried to her side, peering over her shoulder.

Owen said smugly, "I knew it would work."

"Neutralize…" Brian whispered to himself, and then shouted, "Press three!"

"Why?" Wendy asked. "We have no idea –"

Brian's voice was filled with excitement as he spoke, "If we neutralize the reactor, this compass will stop pointing at it. This is why we're here!"

Owen frowned. "I thought we were here to find a question mark, not to shut off some magnetic mojo-jojo."

"I think maybe we should –" Wendy began to say, but Brian pushed her aside and pressed the button before anyone of them could react.

"Oh bloody…" Owen's voice trailed off as the reactor – the two coils – began to buzz even louder. Sparks flew from it and Wendy yelled in shock. The sound became almost unbearable. They covered their ears but they were unable to look away. They saw the blue liquid melt and run down to the ground – the roof shaking and the walls with it until it felt like everything would break.

Then, it simply stopped. The buzzing faded away, the air cooled and when it went completely silent... Owen hit Brian over the head. Swearing he was even more of an idiot than Fox.

A low _ping_ came from the computer, interrupting the stunned silence.

Wendy tore her gaze from the reactor to the screen. "Um… Look…" She pointed at the screen where three words had come up:

**Peto question vestigium**

"What the hell does that mean?" Brian asked.

Owen frowned deeply and sighed. "It means we're gonna find your stupid question mark, let's go. Whatever we thought was here – is not."

--

After hours and hours of work – it had begun to resemble a house, maybe even a church.

Allen was proud of himself. The survivors had been very skeptic towards the work. Thinking it was unnecessary, didn't believe in churches, or thought that if they would build something – why not a house for themselves?

But it was the fact to have something to do to keep the thoughts way from rescue, home and all other things he wished he had. It was easier when he could concentrate on something else.

Eko was sleeping by the church, set to guard it for some mysterious reason. Allen himself stayed at the camp of course, and he looked forward to get back and have something to eat before he said goodnight to his daughter.

"Hey Sun." He smiled at her and took down a Dharma box with Fish crackers. "Have you seen Ellie around?"

"I think she was with Libby," Sun answered. "How is it going with the church?"

"Now it looks like something more than a bunch of chopped off trees now at least."

Sun laughed and Allen, with a plate walked away to find his daughter, chewing on one of the crackers.

To his surprise he saw Libby stand and talk to Hurley by her tent, laughing.

"Libby, hey Hurley."

Hurley grinned, still making eye contact with Libby. "What's up dude?"

"Have you seen Ellie?"

Libby tore her gaze from Hurley and turned to him. "I was playing with her at the jungle, she said she would visit you at the church – " Her eyes widened. "– that was about one hour ago…"

Allen dropped the plate on the sand. But he didn't care. He knew it was stupid, somewhere back in his mind to worry so much. But he did, he did worry and he did have reasons.

He asked Charlie, sitting by his shelter playing on his guitar. He asked the Frogurt guy, Neil, but he didn't even know who Ellie was. He asked Zidler and then he asked Margo – who both looked strangely annoyed. He went back to the church, asked if she'd gone with someone to the hatch or to the caves.

But Ellie was nowhere to be seen.

--

**Author's Notes:** Part one in a chapter split in two parts, the next part will continue Flor's flashbacks, the search for the question mark and a lot more.

Thank you guys for your brilliant reviews! Really, nothing makes me happier! Well, seeing a LOST episode does but you know.

And all you Gamers who have played the Lost game Via Domus see there are still many locations and things in this story. So yes, the reactor does exist in the LOST universe.

Namaste.


	27. Hopes Are Dying, Part 2

Though I turn, I fly not —  
I cannot depart;  
I would try, but try not  
To release my heart.  
And my hopes are dying  
While, on dreams relying,  
I am spelled by art.

_Thus, the bright snake coiling  
'Neath the forest tree  
Wins the bird, beguiling,  
To come down and see:  
Like that bird the lover  
Round his fate will hover  
Till the blow is over  
And he sinks — like me._

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
****Chapter 23 Part 2, Hopes Are Dying**

--

Flor swallowed. Her heart beat hard in her chest. She watched them all stare at her, their faces blank. She searched for something, any sort of reaction. What if they all disagreed? What if they just turned around and walked away?

Jack finally nodded. "Yeah, that's a good idea." He gave Flor an encouraging look, like a teacher who said a kid's writing was good but could be improved. "We should assemble a group, there's been talking about the army –"

"I know Ana-Lucia would be eager to join." Sean's face warmed up a little.

"We should also try to –"

"What the hell!"

Flor jumped at the shout. The others went silent.

Bonnie got up to her feet, her face red in anger and grief. "They… they aren't even buried yet." She shook her head, like she couldn't believe them. "And here we are talking about going on some damn suicidal mission! Their… Lalita doesn't even know… we… we…" Tears once again welled up in her eyes and she looked away.

Dom took four long steps over to her side and he put a hand on her shoulder. "Of course."

Maybe it was Dom's seriousness that made them all keep silent. Maybe it was just shame.

Flor kept staring at the two bodies when they carried them back to the camp, their dead eyes and the dried blood, just watching, playing the scene of their death over and over again in her head.

No one spoke. There was so much to talk about. But no one had the strength to.

The leaves rustled above their heads. The moon barely visible between the branches. The sounds of the jungle thick in the night.

But one sound was different.

A small whimper.

Flor's eyes widened and she swung around. They asked her questions. But she didn't hear them. She heard another whine, small, almost drowning in the other sounds that ruled their surroundings.

"Don't you hear it?" she asked. They stopped, watching the jungle around them. Flor took a few steps back, listening intently.

There it was again.

She realized it was coming from somewhere by the small rocks. "Down there!" she shouted, running down the gritty slope. Sean, Dom, Bonnie and Jack were carrying the bodies and couldn't follow.

Above, it looked like the form on the ground was just some big rocks, a part of the ground. But now she saw that it was a small body, thrown on the ground with its face down.

She knelt down beside the body of the child. She pulled the hood away from the head, revealing a mess of blonde locks.

Her body protested in pain when she took the little girl up in her arms. She didn't bother try to ease the aching off her shoulder – instead she tried to be careful so she wouldn't hurt the girl more, her arms were covered in bruises.

"Ellie?" Bonnie yelled, her voice terrified.

"Please wake up," Flor whispered into the little girl's ear.

----

"Hi."

Florence nervously looked at the man sitting on the box; he was reading a book – a _Brief History of Time__._ He glanced up at Juliet and muttered something under his breath before he shut the book, standing up with a resigned sigh.

"The trial is already over?" He nodded at Flor.

"Hey to you too Aldo." Flor wondered how Aldo could look so unaffected by Juliet's piercing gaze. "Yes it is over. I'm supposed to bring her to Room 23."

His eyes narrowed and his hand hovered closer to the gun in its holster. "I don't know Juliet… Richard hasn't contacted me…"

"Do you want to radio him and interrupt his session or what?" Juliet raised an eyebrow. "She tried to escape."

"Oh," Aldo said, his eyes now widening, "Oh. I get it. But Juliet –" he said as she with a hard grip on Flor's arm walked to the door, "– Don't disturb _him._"

Juliet nodded shortly, closing the door behind them.

"What's Room 23?" Flor asked in a whisper. The whole place felt like it had been flooded, leaving a weird smell in the air and slippery walls behind. Juliet led her into a long corridor, doors on every side of them, some almost blending in with the wall and others standing out like roses in a garden of weeds.

"Walt's not there." She didn't really answer her question. "He's in…" Juliet's gaze trailed over the door's numbers, "here."

Juliet took out a rusty key from her pocket and put it in the lock.

Flor faked a smile. "So you are like the… prison guard? And the attorney?"

Juliet's laugh was just as fake as Flor's smile. "No, I'm not."

She opened the door and Flor went in before her. The first thing she noticed was the smell. It stunk of something rotten and she couldn't help but gag.

"FLOR!" a boy shouted and she was embraced in a tight hug.

"Walt!" Flor hugged him back, holding him closely, but then pulled away so she could look at him.

He looked quite the same. He'd gotten different clothes though, a simple blue t-shirt and worn-out jeans. He didn't have any bruises, but there was a small band-aid over his left arm. He looked sad, even though his eyes shone at seeing her. She felt a pang in her chest at the thought of what they might have done to him.

"Are you okay?" she asked, sounding a bit frantic.

Walt looked over her shoulder and Flor turned around. Juliet still stood in the doorway.

Walt turned to her again. "They keep doing experiments on me."

"Walt." Juliet's voice sounded harsh. "No talking about that."

"They keep you locked in too don't they?" Walt asked hurriedly.

Flor nodded. "Yeah, all the time." As she turned her gaze from Walt. She got a quick overview of the room. It was far more pleasant than her old storage. There was a bed in the right corner, a nightstand with a lamp and a stack of comic books. A bunch of board games lay on a table below the high window. She was glad he had it better than her.

"How much time?" Flor asked Juliet.

"That depends on what you're willing to sacrifice," Juliet replied.

"Anything."

Julie still stood by the door, but Flor and Walt sat down on the bed, Walt hugging his knees while looking at her.

"What is it?" Flor asked finally.

"Your face," he said, "it's... Did they hurt you?"

Flor thought of the question for a couple of seconds until she said, "No, they didn't."

"My Dad's not with you is he?" Walt sounded like he was trying to sound brave, but actually was really worried.

"No, he didn't get taken. I'm sure. Not Lori or Jin either, it's just us."

"What do they do to you?"

"I said no talking about that!" Juliet repeated, sounding annoyed.

"Walt… I promise you I will get us out of here okay?" It was a lie, a promise meant to be broken. "I bet your Dad's looking after us right now. There's nothing a parent wouldn't do for their child. So if I can't rescue you, he... they will."

Walt grinned, a sad grin but it was still something somewhat happy. "I know he will."

He suddenly put his arms around her in a hug again. She was a bit stunned but hugged him back too. Almost missing the urgent words he was whispering to her, so that Juliet wouldn't hear, "They're crazy Flor. They think they know the future – they think Zidler is –"

"Florence." A hand grabbed her shoulder and she swung around. Juliet stood behind her. She hadn't even heard her take a step. "Come with me."

Flor held Walt's hand as long as she could until she had to let go. She just wanted him to feel safe. Oh God, these people were monsters. Keeping a child locked in and doing… Flor glanced at Juliet. _Experiments._ The word sent shivers through her spine. She had no idea what kind of experiments they put him though. But judging by the frightened look on his face…

When the door was closed behind them Juliet grabbed her arm even harder than before. And Flor heard steps coming from somewhere further down the corridor.

"Juliet!" A woman came out from the shadows. Her hair was dirty blonde and curly, her eyes suspicious as she watched them. She held her head high, her back strained in a military-like pose. "What the hell are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be at the trial?"

"The trial ended early, if you'd been there you would now," Juliet said calmly.

The woman pursed her lips at the last comment before she spat, "And what is she doing here?"

"I brought her to Room 23."

"Huh." The woman's gaze lingered on Flor. "She's not supposed to be in Room 23."

"She is now."

"I'm radioing the main station." The woman glanced at her before she opened one of those doors that looked like a part of the wall. Flor could hear her speak quietly.

"Juliet…" Flor whispered. "Do you… Uhm, got a plan?"

"It was wrong to bring you here Florence." Juliet kept her gaze on the door to the room the woman had gone into. "I'm sorry. It was a spur of the moment decision and now you're gonna pay for it."

"Pay for it?"

The woman came back and gave Juliet a murdering look. "Isabel says she's going to Room 23."

Juliet bowed her head. "Very well then." And they walked once again down the corridor, now the light was even dimmer.

"She also says she wants you at her office as soon as you've dropped the prisoner off!" she shouted after them.

Juliet stopped at a door with the sign '23' on it. It was at the end of the hall.

"What's in this room?" Flor asked. Juliet's expression was so grave and she felt her worry rise inside her chest.

She opened the door and said gravely, "I'm sorry."

And the nightmares began.

----

Wendy wasn't back yet.

That should be the reason for her annoyance – but it wasn't. She could live without telling the survivors the truth for one day more.

It was the fact that she couldn't tell Zidler that bothered her.

Since Margo was weird she had her morning sickness on the night. Or not really. She had it all the time, in the mornings, in the middle of the day, in the evenings, in the nights.

So now she was returning from the jungle, a foul taste in her mouth and not really in the best of moods. And when she saw Allen running around asking for his daughter she couldn't help but snap at him.

She was sure Ellie was fine; the girl was probably with Ana-Lucia somewhere.

She suddenly felt ashamed of herself. What if it was her child missing? Would she just freak out? She had sort of gotten used to being pregnant. But then there would be the whole business with the baby later.

A baby.

That she was supposed to take care of.

And she couldn't even tell people the truth.

Pregnancy had really turned her selfish. She guessed her sister would be happy about that, she who always told Margo to stop worrying about everyone else all the time.

She crossed the camp quickly and saw Allen by the church, speaking frantically with Eko who was as always – very, very calm.

"Al!" she shouted, stepping over the sand. "Maybe she just went into the jungle to play; I can help you look for her there."

Allen still look panicked, but made a grimace that possibly was supposed to be a smile. "Thank you, no one's seen her and I…"

"It's okay. No reason to act like all hopes are dying." She smiled weakly. "C'mon."

She had only taken two steps when Eko said behind her:

"What is…"

She turned around. His mouth was open in shock and he looked confused. She swung around again, to see what he was looking at.

Out of the jungle Flor came first, carrying a small body in her arms. Behind her two bodies were carried by Dom, Bonnie, Sean and Jack. it felt like Margo's heart dropped to her stomach of shock.

"ELLIE!" Allen screamed and darted towards them. Shouting and yelling. He sounded so absolutely helpless – hopeless and he took the child away from Flor and into his embrace.

Margo felt sick again and bent down to the ground.

--

Kim woke up by someone's scream.

And the fact that her small excuse of a shelter collapsed on top of her _again._

She groaned, trying to get the blanket away from her face.

"Kim?" A hand reached into hers and she was pulled up from the rubbish.

Kim blinked and then smiled. "My own knight in shining armor huh?" she said to Fox.

But Fox didn't stutter, smile back or blush. He just looked at her solemnly.

"What's happened?" she asked. Not knowing if she wanted to know the answer.

Fox just looked to his right and Kim followed his gaze. Her heart almost stopped when she saw the two bodies on the ground and Allen carrying a limp Ellie in his arms.

--

Sawyer had just finished raiding Owen's tent when he heard the scream. It was distant and he didn't think much about it. The yahoos at the camp always seemed to find a way to squeal.

It was when Bonnie threw her arms around him in tears that he realized something wasn't right. Princess wasn't the type that cried at chick-flicks movies or because she broke a nail.

She clung onto him but he pushed her away. Her words 'I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry' echoing in his head as he made his way across the camp, over to the two stretches on the sand – and the two bodies laying on them.

A group was standing around them. But as he came closer they all parted form him to come between. The bodies were covered by blankets.

He pulled one blanket off.

And the one person he cared about most in the world lay underneath it dead.

--

The sunrise was beautiful, the rays streaming onto the earth and heating it up with the first warm light.

But at the beach no one admired its beauty.

Two graves had been dug. One by Sean and Dom and they had already put Naomi's body in it.

Another one Sawyer made. And he didn't allow anybody to help him.

Rosalie looked peaceful down in the earth. He'd covered her body and the red from the blood. But her face he had let show. A ray from the sun lightened up her closed eyelids. It made her dark skin almost glimmer form the beam.

She was beautiful. She always had been.

The only words Sawyer had uttered after seeing her body was 'Lalita ain't here anymore' when Jack asked where she was. And the look was enough to tell him the rest – she'd gone after Eva.

And now she wasn't here. Simple as that. Rosalie had died and was going to be buried without her wife being there.

He turned his face away, tried to hold back the tears. Suddenly a hand was put on his face and he saw Lori. She didn't see him, but she gently touched the corner of his eyes, knowing his tears. She pulled her hand away. Didn't say anything. Didn't make fun of him. Just took his hand into hers.

Jack waited for Sawyer to say something. But Sawyer was just staring down at Rosalie, his lips closed in a thin line.

Bonnie stepped forward, looking carefully at Sawyer. But Sawyer still didn't talk.

So Bonnie took a shivering breath and turned to the survivors.

"Rosalie," she said tearfully, "was one of the bravest women – one of the best human beings this world has ever known… okay?" she added at the end. Like anyone of them would disagree.

"She was brave and she was strong and yet bad things always happened to her." She turned her gaze down at Rosalie's face again. "She lost her wife and her daughter, the use of her legs. And she got almost all of it back… almost. She didn't get her daughter. She didn't get to be reunited with her daughter before she…. before she…"

Bonnie hiccupped and put a hand over her mouth. She took another breath. "She didn't deserve this!" she almost yelled, her voice high. "She was so much better to the world! And the ones who killed her…" She brushed away her tears, looking more determined than ever. "They will rot in hell," she snarled.

"They will pay for what they've done. Isn't that right?" She turned to them again. "They have to pay! Because these people… they don't deserve to live."

"Bonnie…" It was Rose, her voice was soothing, far more calmer than what Jack was feeling.

"WE HAVE TO!" she roared.

"Stop." Jack took a step forward and took Bonnie's arm gently. Bonnie stared into his eyes.

She then burst into tears again and Rose put her arms around her to comfort.

Jack looked around, at the shocked, sad, maybe even vengeful people. And he felt that too. The need for revenge. To make then pay.

But he still remembered.

"Rosalie helped me a lot. And there was one advice that I remember the best," he said hoarsely. "An advice that really shows who she was, and how we have to move on from here. She said that if she died… She would want everyone to be happy." He glanced at Sawyer. "She wanted people to live. She didn't want anyone to be so sad they wouldn't be able to do anything. She wanted people to… as she said… breathe the air and know she wanted them too."

He looked down the grave. "And we will. We will remember you. Rest in peace Rosalie."

--

Margo held a hand over her mouth as she walked away from the funeral. She'd stayed there a while. Helped covering the grave with sand. She's stayed a long time, after everyone – even Sawyer had left.

And she'd poured everything out. She'd cried, smiled and even laughed quietly as she sat by the grave when she told the story of how she got pregnant. About how scared she was. About how she was afraid the baby maybe would be hurt if she had an asthma attack. About how absolutely freaking terrified she was of maybe having to give birth on the island now that the satellite phone was gone and Naomi was gone too.

And it felt good.

She just wished Wendy would come back so she could tell everyone. She hoped she was okay. But she probably was. Wendy could always take care of herself.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Jack enter his own tent; she knew that inside Ellie and Allen were. And she didn't know if Ellie had woken up yet. They'd found her in the jungle, and it seemed like someone had tried to kidnap her.

She hoped the little girl was okay too.

She heard a sob and turned around. There weren't anyone close to her. She peered between the trees of the jungle, the sob came from there.

And in there, sitting on the same rock she'd been crying on before, Zidler was.

It felt like something inside of her broke at the sight.

"Zidler?" she said carefully.

Zidler yelled and fell to the ground.

"Zidler!" She ran over to his side.

"I'm okay, I'm okay." He turned his face away, his face a shade of red.

"I already saw you crying," Margo said softly.

Zidler huffed. "I was not."

A few seconds later, they both were.

--

Her head rolled to the side, her eyes moving though they were close. They suddenly fluttered and she gasped. "Daddy?" she whimpered.

"Ellie!" Allen breathed happily and kissed her forehead. "Oh sweetie…"

"Daddy I'm scared." Ellie wrinkled her face and tears began to fall down her face. She took a hand over her eyes like she wanted to scratch out the pain – or as little children often thought, that if they kept their eyes closed long enough everything would go away.

Allen wanted nothing more than to take her in his arms and never let her go. But Jack had said Ellie should keep still.

"Ellie," said Jack gently, "how are you feeling?"

"It hurts." More tears ran down her cheeks. "Daddy, make it stop."

"Ellie," Jack said again before Allen got the chance, "how many fingers am I holding up?"

Ellie looked at him through her fingers. "Two," she said.

He was holding up one.

"I mean… three." She looked tearfully at her father again. "Daddy, someone pulled something over my head!"

"You are safe, you are safe now honey. I won't let anyone hurt you."

Ellie whimpered again. "I'm scared."

"Who took you into the jungle?" Jack asked.

Allen glared at him, wanting to tell him not to ask questions like that to his daughter, but Ellie answered quickly.

"Other."

--

"Ow – ouch!"

"HOW COULD YOU?" Flor roared. She'd pulled Michael into the trees harshly despite her wounded shoulder.

Michael stared at her. "What – what the hell…"

"You took that poor little girl and you…" Flor shook her head in absolute loathing. She hit his arm hard. "You are a monster!"

Michael winced. "I did what had to be done –"

Flor interrupted him by kicking him on the leg.

"Freaking – Flor!" He grabbed both of her arms, holding her in a steady grip. "Allen would never have come with us otherwise. Now he has a reason! To avenge his daughter and make sure she will stay safe!"

"You bastard!" Flor spat. "You can't – she's an innocent child!"

He leaned closer, still holding her. "Do I have to remind you we are doing this for other children?"

Flor defiantly met his gaze. "Not if means hurting other kids."

"You seemed okay with murder."

Flor inhaled sharply. "I didn't… They…"

He let her go. Flor didn't hit him again.

"Now, let's make sure we get everyone on that list."

He turned away and Flor shouted after him, "Too late for that remember!"

----

Flor watched Juliet enter the room. She covered her eyes with her hand and rolled over to the other side.

"Florence…" Juliet said in a gentle voice. "Look at me."

The images were burned into her mind. Flaming up all the time. It hurt. It all hurt.

_We are the causes of our own suffering. _

"Florence I brought you some food."

Flor was still keeping her eyes shut, her face away from hers. She wanted Juliet to shut up. She didn't want to hear her words – others were always repeating inside her head.

_Everything changes._

"And some water, you must be thirsty."

_God loves you as He loved Jacob._

A hand was put on her shoulder and Juliet pulled her so she was lying with her face up. Flor opened her eyes and met her blue gaze.

"Come with me."

Juliet helped her up on her feet, holding her hand. In the end, she had an arm around Flor so she would be able to walk with her. Otherwise she would've just collapsed on the floor.

"Everything's too bright," Flor whispered, burying her face in Juliet's shoulder, not caring, not giving a damn that this was the woman who kidnapped her. Because compared to everyone else Juliet was a saint. If she just could get the sound out of her head.

_God loves you as He loved Jacob._

"Did God love Jacob much?" she mumbled.

"Shhh…" Juliet led her into a room. Flor knew that because she stepped over a threshold.

"Sit down." Juliet let go of her and pushed her into a chair. Flor blinked, before her were many monitors and something that looked like a control panel.

A screen.

More images tormented her mind and she curled both of her hands into fists.

"What…"

"This is the surveillance room." Flor heard the door close. Juliet returned with something in her hand, it was black and – Flor blinked again – it was a videotape.

"What is that?"

"Something you have to see. Some of it has been erased. But believe me; it's for your own good. This video was filmed many years ago, back in the seventies."

One of the monitor's screens flickered and then a normal chair came into view.

"_Is this, is this thing on?" _a voice said from somewhere outside the view.

"_Yes," _a very tired voice responded.

"_Are you sure? It's blinking –"_

"_I'm sure!"_

"_Oh, okay… um…"_ The shadow disappeared from the screen and the person sat down in a chair, hands nervously twisting and deep breaths. The eyes were familiar, the face and when the guy spoke again, Flor felt like she recognized him. The hair might be shorter, face older, eyes more sad, but it was him.

She turned to Juliet, standing by her side. "Is that –"

"Yes."

"But how?"

Juliet shook her head slowly. "I don't know. Listen, you missed his introduction."

He continued, _"I have counted on this message being discovered after… well, after…"_

"_Everything,"_ said the other familiar voice.

"_Everything right,"_ he said a bit reluctantly, _"hopefully with me still in one piece."_ He cleared his throat. _"Anyway, when this message is discovered, you will either be one of the Hostiles – the Others, or one of the survivors from Flight 815 if I'm happy. If you're not… and your last name isn't Phelps, I suggest you turn the tape off now."_

A couple of seconds passed as he stared into the camera defiantly. _"Great, so… um, great person?"_

"_Whoever sees this."_

"_Whoever sees this, the message I want to give you is very simple. In fact, it's so ridiculously simple I don't understand why I have to give it in the first place. On September 22, a plane will crash on this very island. Many people will survive, but there's only two who you have to be concerned about... sort of. One of them is called Florence Bluth, but the other one, is far more important than her."_

He looked past the camera, at whoever it was sitting behind it before he continued to speak, _"Her name is Rosalie Mills-Burton, and the reason I'm sending you this message, is because you have to, by all means, whatever it takes, keep her alive… And the other woman. Florence Bluth is very dangerous, and I have proof. Here…"_

"Juliet!"

Juliet widened her eyes and quickly shut the monitor off. She dragged Flor up on her feet and pulled her close to a locker so that she was out of view from the door, but she could still hear.

"Beatrice," Juliet said calmly, "hey, aren't you supposed to be at the village?"

"There was a complication. Why are you here?"

"Oh, I was just looking for... Colleen. And decided to guard this room instead."

"Guard?"

"Yes. As you perfectly know Bea we got a prisoner and we wouldn't like her to find this place would we?"

"Hmm. Do you know where Isabel is? There is something I need to discuss with her."

"No I haven't."

"May I come in and look at the monitors?"

Flor tensed and awaited Juliet's reply.

"Well..."

"Bea!" someone shouted.

"Hello Isabel..."

The door closed and Juliet walked over to her again.

Flor was trembling hard, out of fear and out of shock of what she'd seen. She sat down on the floor, it didn't help her shivering.

"That was..."

"That was close." Juliet smiled.

----

"Actually Michael, a lot of people want to come, there's been talk about this army –"

"And just how long would that take to train Jack?" Michael said in a stressed voice. "We have to go now. My son is with them, every second, all the time. And as I said – I already know who I wanna bring."

Jack shook his head slowly. "Flor is wounded; you can't seriously suggest she would come along. And Sawyer's mourning and –"

"Jack", Michael said, "I can talk them into it. Just let me deal with it okay?"

"Fine." Jack sighed deeply. "Andrea won't be happy about it."

Jack walked away in Andrea's direction. Michael sighed himself and rubbed his temple. He needed sleep. But there were other things he had to deal with first.

Allen crawled out of Jack's tent and up to his feet. His eyes were swollen from tears and he stared at the ground as he walked towards the water supply.

Michael caught up with him quickly. "Allen!"

Allen barely looked up. "I don't have time for talking right now." He grabbed a water bottle.

"I know, I know. But look – it's important. Just a minute okay?"

Allen nodded shortly.

"There's a group of us getting ready to go back to the Others camp, rescue my son, take down some of them."

"What does that have to do with me?" Allen said, his voice fatigued.

"Are you in?"

"In on what?"

"On coming with us."

Allen chuckled without any joy and began to walk back to the tent. "I have to take care of my daughter; I'm not going anywhere until she's safe."

Michael grabbed his arm and the water bottle dropped to the ground. "Listen! Your daughter will never be safe! The Others was the ones to take her all right? And they won't stop trying until they got her. But there is a way to stop it, come with us, make sure they won't ever return."

"I'll think about it," Allen muttered before he stepped into the tent again.

--

"You're walking too slow!" Owen had exclaimed, before grabbing the compass, the note and began to stomp through the jungle at a high pace. She'd scowled at them if they tried to talk to her, and screamed if they slowed down.

Wendy panted, holding her stomach as she and Brian tried to keep up with her.

"Are you okay?" Brian asked her quietly.

She glanced his way. "What?"

"You know..." He nodded at her belly. "I can knock Owen out so we can rest if you wanna."

Wendy shook her head. "It's okay."

Owen muttered to herself in front of them and they went silent, continuing to walk quickly.

As they've walked on for a little while longer, when the time had passed morning, Brian slowed down. He frowned at the scenery around him. He recognized it faintly.

"I got a bad feeling about this," he said quietly, watching the trees.

"HURRY UP!" Owen yelled.

"She sure wants to find that question thingy." Wendy took his arm and they hurried their pace again.

Soon they heard Owen yell from out of sight:

"This is GREAT."

Brian looked worriedly at Wendy. "Anything that's great to _Owen_..."

"Is probably poisonous," Wendy finished. Without hesitation, they started to run.

The trees cleared and Owen came into view. She was standing by a cliff, next to a small plane, grinning like she'd won the lottery.

Owen stared at the plane. "Wow, that's... uhm..." She didn't seem to find the right words. She just ran up beside Owen and touched it, her eyes widening like she hadn't been sure it'd been real from afar.

Brian stayed on his spot. His heart was still pulsing hard even though he wasn't running anymore.

"Brian?" Wendy shouted from the plane. "You okay?"

Images flashed through his mind, he saw himself climb into the plane; he remembered a voice, shouting, falling, crushing. Boone's face coming into sight. First time sad, asking questions, worried. Next time simple determination, smirking... _We're even now._

He swallowed, forcing the memories away and walked up to them, tried to act normal. Wendy was still looking at him with narrow eyes. But Owen was more concerned with playing with two Virgin Mary statues.

"This is all very cool... But, this doesn't really look like a question mark does it?"

Owen put down the statues on the ground. "Not from here."

"What do you mean?"

Owen pointed a finger at the sky. "I'm saying we go _up._"

Brian did not approve of going up.

Wendy rolled her eyes, grabbed a backpack from Owen and said she didn't care at all as long as she got some water.

Owen wanted to go up.

And really – if Owen wanted something, she got it.

Brian muttered, swore and even shouted. But Owen pulled herself up on the cliff, holding onto the vines for her dear life. Wendy couldn't pretend she didn't care any longer as she herself begged Owen to come down when she almost fell.

When Owen was at the top – none of them could believe it. She raised both of her hands in the air, a victory gesture before she pointed behind them.

"There it is!"

--

"Why can't I come with you?"

"Bonnie..." Flor raised her hands as if to calm her down. Bonnie was furious, her face red, screaming, spitting at her.

"Rosalie was my friend! And if you're going on a mission to take down those bastards then I'm coming with you! You can't stop me!"

"Bonnie," Flor was almost sobbing, "Please, you have to understand –"

Bonnie raised her hand, to hit her, to silence her she didn't know, because someone interfered before she could do anything.

"Hey!" Sean shouted, grabbing Bonnie's arms. Bonnie wriggled out of his grip, shooting daggers with her eyes at him. "Calm down, Bonnie! Otherwise you're gonna do something you'll regret!"

"I'm coming with you –"

"Look at yourself! Bonnie you are mad with grief. You can't come with us. Sorry."

Bonnie shook her head. "This is not over." She stormed off, casting furious glances their way.

Sean turned to Flor, worry in his eyes. "Are you okay?"

He sounded so honest.

She hated that.

So instead of saying anything, she just walked away.

----

"What is that?"

Flor didn't turn around. She stayed with her face against the wall, a smile playing on her lips. "It's a count. Of how long I've been here. I don't really know how many days actually have gone so I just started off at one month. So now I've been here one month and one day."

Juliet gaped at the lines in the wall, and didn't even ask how she'd done it.

Flor finally turned around, her smile disappearing to be replaced by confusion. Juliet's face was streaked with tears and her hands were shivering slightly.

"What's... What's going on? Juliet, what's the matter?"

"They decided it today." Juliet's voice trembled. "They decided that you will be executed..."

Flor shook her head wildly. "No, no they wouldn't –"

"I'm sorry..."

"No!" Flor yelled. "They can't! They can't kill me! No!"

Tears were falling down her face. "I'm so sorry."

"No you..." Flor's anger flooded out of her and she sat down on the floor, unable to stay on her legs. "No..."

Juliet wiped away her tears. "Believe me I'm sorry. But they got reasons. They really do."

Flor buried her face in her knees, hugging herself. "The tape?" she mumbled.

"Yes..."

Flor looked up. "A stupid tape decides if I should live or die?"

"You didn't see the whole thing. And there is more to it –"

"I haven't done ANYTHING!"

"She should learn to control her temper."

Both Flor and Juliet turned their gaze to the doorway, there a black woman stood, her eyes were big, dark and when they met Flor she realized someone in the world did have scarier eyes than Juliet.

"Bea," Juliet said, her face becoming just a little redder but her voice was all the sudden steady. Not a trace of sadness left.

"There has been another... complication Juliet. I need to speak with you."

Juliet cast a glance Flor's way before she closed the door carefully. Flor ran up and pressed her ear against the door, the voices were muffled, but she could hear some of it.

"...They are getting impatient. Ethan reported..." She pressed against the door harder, desperate to hear anything.

"... Change of plans. There has been new evidence found. An order back from the old..." The voice faltered and she couldn't hear what was said next.

"And we got two prisoners..." She could hear Juliet say.

"Isabel won't be happy."

Flor flew back from the door and it opened a second later. The woman – Bea was gone and Juliet looked into her eyes.

"There has been a change of plans. You will not be executed."

None of them smiled. Juliet looked like she was about to cry again. Somehow, Flor knew this wasn't good news.

"And I have to teach you the story," she said, making it sound like the most horrid thing in the world.

"What story?"

"The false story you're gonna tell your friend Michael. But first..." Juliet looked down, "You have to see your son."

----

Lori cast the gun up in the air and amazingly – she caught it. "I'm ready to go."

Jack grabbed the gun from her hands impatiently. "You don't throw guns around." He hesitated, almost adding the bit about 'her being blind'.

"It's not loaded, chill."

Jack couldn't 'chill'. He'd just been yelled at by Andrea, her screaming something about making a rebellion while he was gone. And then there was the fact that both Rosalie and Naomi had been shot by just a gun.

And, the satellite phone was gone, their way off the island. As Charlie would sarcastically put it – life was bloody brilliant.

"So when did Mikey wanna leave?"

"Tomorrow morning," Jack told her, zipping up the bag. "First thing. So if you wanna come along you better start packing."

"You know you are acting very adult-ish?"

"That's because I am an adult."

She scoffed.

--

"I didn't know them really." Kim hugged her knees and looked out at the sea. "Not much, I knew Lalita though, and she... she would always describe Rosalie like the most amazing person in the world you know? And... And now she's just gone."

Fox swallowed and tried to think of anything, just one thing to say to make it all better. Kim was the tearful one, and yet he'd known Rosalie better than her.

It was just that weird feeling in his chest. He couldn't really figure out what it was. Things were just getting more and more confusing by the minute. His life wasn't controlled by him anymore. Owen had confirmed that. They always watched him. Kept control of the survivors and still...

"I can't believe him!" Andrea slouched down on the little space between Fox and Kim. "Jack is such a royal pain in the ass."

Kim sniffed and cleared her throat. "What did he do?"

"He's organizing this rescue and killing mission and he won't let me come with them! Not Ana either and not even Bonnie, instead he's bringing the traumatized girl Florence and the blind chick!"

"That's weird."

Andrea nodded in agreement. "Yes. Very weird. I just wish there was something I could do..."

"W-weren't you t-talking about an army before?"

Andrea looked at Fox like she'd never seen him before, which maybe she hadn't. Her lips curled up in a smirk. "You really are a genius." She struggled up on her feet.

"Where are you going?" Kim shouted.

"To get myself an army!"

--

Brian clenched his teeth. Together they all pushed the plane until Owen told them to stop.

"It's here..." She pulled at the vines and the roots. Underneath the vegetation a similar hatch door like the one at the Swan was revealed.

"You know," Wendy said as Owen pulled the hatch door open, "I thought you were kind of crazy. But now... there really is a question mark."

Brian grinned. "So I'm not crazy?"

Wendy raised her hands. "I'm not saying anything."

Brian peered down the hatch. There was a very freaky-looking ladder and at the end only darkness.

Owen didn't hesitate; she just climbed down without a word.

Wendy and Brian waited above. They didn't hear her scream. So it meant she hadn't been eaten by a monster. That was quite a relief.

"I'll go first." Brian climbed down. Supporting himself with the wall on his back. When he reached the ground, Owen turned on the light.

The small corridor led into an octagonal room. On the opposite wall, there were nine monitors. Two chairs were placed in front of them. Cabinets were built inside the walls, notebooks lined up inside them.

He heard Wendy land with a thud on the floor behind him. "What is this place?" she asked.

Brian walked up to a closed closet. He opened it up and dust blew into his face. He coughed violently, Owen chuckled. There on the shelf, an old video tape laid.

Wendy fingered on the monitors. Turning on one of the dials beside one of them. A shout from her made Brian turn around.

"Look!" Wendy pointed at the screen.

"Is that the hatch?" Brian asked, not believing his eyes.

"Look, there's the Frogurt guy!" Wendy shouted again.

"It _is _the hatch." Owen stared at Frogurt playing ping-pong by himself. She laughed as he missed the ball four times in a row.

"I found a tape," Brian said after Frogurt missed the ball for the eight time.

They fought over the chairs; Owen won because she had sharp nails and Wendy because she was pregnant. Brian growled, standing behind them, watching the monitor for the video to play.

A Dharma logo showed up on the screen, underneath it text appeared: Orientation - Station 5 - The Pearl.

The same man that was in the Swan Orientation video stood there, in the same room they were in on the screen.

"_Hello, I'm Dr. Mark Wickman,_" he said, "_and this is the orientation film for Station 5 of DHARMA Initiative. Station 5, or the Pearl, is a monitoring station where the activities of participants in DHARMA Initiative projects can be observed and recorded - not only for posterity, but for the ongoing refinement of the Initiative as a whole. As Karen DeGroot herself has written, 'Careful observation in the only key to true and complete awareness._'" He paused.

"_Your tour of duty will last three weeks and during this time you and your partner will observe a psychological experiment in progress. Your duty is to observe team members at another station on the Island. These team members are not aware that they are under surveillance, or that they are the subjects of an experiment._"

"Experiment?" Wendy mumbled, frowning.

"_Working in 8 hour shifts, you and your partner will record everything you observe in the notebooks we provided._" Brian glanced at the notebooks on in the cabinet.

The man continued, "_What is the nature of the experiment, you might ask? What do these subjects believe they are accomplishing as they struggle to fulfil their tasks? You, as the observer, don't need to know. All you need to know is the subjects believe their job is of the utmost importance. Remember, everything that occurs, no matter how minute or seemingly unimportant, must be recorded. Each time a notebook is filled with the fruits of your diligent observation, roll it up..._" The screen flickered.

"_...containers provided. Then, simply place the container in the pneumatic tube, and presto, it will be transported directly to us. At the end of your 8 hour shift, proceed to the Pala ferry which will take you back to the barracks..._" The sound went static. _"... Prepare for your next shift..."_

"Come on!" Wendy yelled as the screen flickered again.

"_...behalf of the DeGroots, Alvar Hanso, and all of us here at the DHARMA Initiative, thank you. Namaste and good luck."_

"Does that mean... Does that mean the hatch is useless?" Wendy stared at Brian with wide eyes.

"It means exactly that," an unfamiliar voice said.

Brian swung around. He felt a sharp pain in his neck and he fell to the ground, groggily he looked up and saw a tall man, holding a needle, he had a light scar above his eyebrow. He couldn't move, his mind was slipping away and he fumbled after nothing.

"Nice. Can I take the tape?" Owen said from far, far away. It was the last thing he heard before the world disappeared.

--

Flor buried her face down in the blanket, curling her fist around it, gripping it tight. She cried softly – quiet. And only for a little while. She didn't want anyone to hear – anyone to know. But someone did hear.

"Here."

Flor looked up. Sawyer stood beside her shelter, holding a piece of the Kim fruit.

Flor stared in disbelief but she took it and he walked away.

The juice dripped between her fingers as she crushed it in her hand. And she gave into the tears once again.

"Two fingers!"

It was Ellie. She could hear her. She heard the little girl giggle as her father shouted that was the right answer.

And she was supposed to split them up.

----

Flor's bones ached when she woke up. She was lying on a couch in an unfamiliar room. Bright light shone in her eyes and she sat fiercely up, squinting.

"You're awake," Juliet said. She came into view. She was standing by a door, smiling a bit sadly down at her.

"Where..."

"Are you?" Juliet walked over to her and picked up a glass from the table. "Drink."

Flor drank. Her throat was just as dry as when she'd first arrived at her cell.

As she drank, Juliet began to tell in a monotone voice, "You are on the island. This is a station called the Flame. You are here because we need to show you something. Don't touch anything or Mikhail will probably shoot you."

Flor was too dizzy to argue. She took Juliet's hand and got up to her feet, swaying a little. This was the same feeling. The same headache and dry throat. What did they do to her last time that they did now?

"Why... Why am I feeling like this?" she asked Juliet as she led her into another room, and another room that she didn't care to inspect.

"Feel like what?"

"Did you inject me..." Flor's voice trailed off as they entered the last room. At one of the walls several monitors were placed above a control panel. All of them were shut off. But what caught her eye was the man sitting on a chair in front of them. He wore an eye patch.

"Ah, she is here. The famous Florence Bluth." The man grinned widely and stood up, reaching out his hand. "It is a pleasure to meet you."

Flor stared at the hand and moved closer to Juliet.

"Not one for pleasantries I see?"

"Just roll the tape Mikhail," said Juliet.

"Fine, fine." Mikhail pressed some buttons on the panel, and one of the monitor's screen flickered. Flor moved closer to it and on the screen was a blurry image. First it became blurrier like someone was adjusting the camera until it turned sharp.

The image was a bit too blue. But it was clear that it was a sunny day. A park was in the view; trees by the edge of it, behind them were large buildings showing a city.

Some kids were playing football, a little girl scoring a goal. A father was pushing his son on the swings. And a family was having a picnic on the grass.

Everything a painful reminder of what she didn't have.

Flor turned around. "Why are you showing me this?" she asked Juliet.

"Tell her to zoom in the camera."

"It's... it's live?" Flor asked stupidly.

The camera zoomed in on the family, sitting on a blanket. The camera rose from the peanut butter jar to show their faces.

Flor covered her mouth with her hands, drowning her gasp.

His face was lightened up by a smile as he kissed the woman sitting on his side. She was beautiful; Flor could see it even from the bad camera, her skin dark and stunning against her blue dress, her smile big and white.

She could see why Byron would love her.

The camera zoomed out, revealing a little figure happily eating a sandwich next to Byron's side. He was wearing his favorite too big boots, a little red t-shirt and a baseball cap.

"Jeremy..." Flor touched the screen with her fingers, trying to reach him but she couldn't. Through tears she saw how Byron took the cap off him and put it on the woman – Bella instead. Jeremy's face wrinkling in annoyance and then in laughter as he chased her for it.

"That is your son," Juliet said from behind her. "The man is your ex-fiancé, and the woman is called Bella. They have been living in Portland since your plane crash. Happily."

"Jeremy..." Flor sobbed. Her heart aching. She missed him so much. It felt like she would crumble to pieces on the floor if she couldn't be with him soon. Hug him. Let him know she was still alive.

"He asks after you. Not so much now. But he asked after you a lot in the beginning. He wonders why you left him."

Flor didn't tear her gaze from the monitor, but she yelled, "I did not leave him!"

"He thinks you did."

Flor didn't answer. She just continued to sob.

"If you do one thing for us. We will let you leave this island. We will make sure Byron and Bella never gets close to him again. We will make sure you're reunited with your son."

"I... I can get back to him?"

"If you do as we ask of you."

On the screen, Jeremy finally got his baseball cap back. He was grinning widely, proudly putting it on top of his head.

"Anything," she said, "I'll do anything."

----

"You got everything ready?"

Flor nodded. "Yes," she answered Michael. "You got everyone else ready?"

"They are in."

"Even him?"

Michael sighed. "Look –"

"Don't bother." She pushed him to the side to grab her backpack, heaving it over her shoulders. It hurt her shoulder painfully, but she clenched her teeth and ignored it.

"A mission, just like old days right Mikey?" Lori flung an arm over his shoulders.

Flor bit her lip again; a small trickle of blood dripped into her mouth.

She'd seen Lori cry in the middle of the night. Flor had woken up by nightmares again, this time it was the nightmare of the flashing lights. She'd gone up, walked back and forth the camp, unable to rest. And she'd seen her.

Everyone was mourning.

Because of her, because of what she'd done.

----

Michael was dirty, smelled horrible and he looked so wounded sitting in the yurt. His arms tied around a pole and his eyes red from tears.

Flor herself had gotten a shower, a change of clothes that covered her wounds and the worst conscience in history.

She hadn't thought she would be able to do it. To look Michael in the eye and tell him the whole lie. Say she'd been there the whole time, saying she hadn't seen Walt, saying she was _fine._

"And they, they took my blood Flor!" Michael spat out the last words, finishing the story.

"Yeah, they took mine too."

He looked down, and then up at her again. "I'm glad you're all right."

Florence's finger trailed over the dirt ground, she bit her lip. "Yeah." It was all she said. She didn't deserve to be all right. "I'm glad you're sort of fine too."

"Walt said they did experiments on him." Michael sighed deeply. "Did they do so on you?"

Flor shook her head. "Nope, nothing. Nothing at all."

She turned her head around at the sound of someone entering the yurt.

"Have you thought about my offer?" Bea asked.

Michael met Flor's gaze, she nodded slightly.

"Yes," he answered.

Bea knelt beside them, holding a note in her hand. "After you release our man, there is something else you have to do."

"Whatever you want," Michael said.

"On this note there are six names – six of your friends. We need you to bring them here. You can only bring these six people, all of these six people or you are not going to see your sons again are we clear?"

They nodded in unison. Bea gave Flor the list.

Six names were written on it: _James Ford, Allen Harwood, Jack Shephard, Lorraine Hume, Sean O'Donnell, Rosalie Mills-Burton._

"Who – who's James Ford?" Flor asked her.

"You may know him as Sawyer. Are you clear on this? Bring them all here?"

Flor nodded gravely. "Yes, yes we are."

She looked at Michael, her scary eyes penetrating his. "Whatever it takes?"

"Whatever it takes."

----

Flor looked around at the group that had assembled around her and Michael. Lori was there, eager as ever. Jack had his bag full with medical supplies – just in case. Sean was holding a gun, loaded in his hands.

Rosalie wasn't there. She was deep in earth.

"Okay," Michael said. "Now we head out."

He'd barely taken a step before someone shouted for them to stop.

Allen came running towards them. "I'm coming with you!"

Michael smiled.

Flor did not.

--

Margo felt her chest tighten, her breaths become shorter. She grabbed a water bottle from Charlie's hand and took a sip. It only made it worse.

She staggered away from him, further down the beach. Clutching her belly, that was only a little bigger, not that anyone had noticed. But she had.

Her breaths came out in wheezes. She knew what she needed. But she could barely take one step further. The heat was too much, the pain in her chest too much and the need for oxygen too much.

"Help..." she hissed, going down on her knees. "Help..." She looked inside the pockets of her pants, there an inhaler was.

But it didn't help. Her eyes watered. Her breaths became even harder. "Help..."

"Margo!" A hand touched her face and another one gripped her shoulder.

"I... am..."

"You need your inhaler," Zidler said, looking like he was about to freak out. He frowned at the sight of the inhaler on the ground. "I need help here!" he shouted.

Margo's voice rattled. "I... not... working..."

"You are going to be okay, come on." He tried to make her stand up but she stayed on the ground.

Tears spilled down her face and. She grabbed his hand, hard and looked directly into his eyes. "No... I'm..." She was holding her other hand over her belly and she said between the tears, "You don't... understand... I'm... pregnant."

She didn't hear Zidler's answer, if there'd been any. Because further up the beach Kim had just shouted:

"Boat! Boat!"

And not too far offshore, a sailboat lay on the waves in the distance.

--

**Author's Notes:** You guys rule. Thank you all for your reviews!

Looks like people are getting kidnapped every other second, if they are all right or not – we'll see. It's coming closer to the sort of season two finale, as you all know. And there are a lot things in store for the survivors. And Fox. And the Others. You know.

And also, if you got the chance and the money, look up some ways to donate to Haiti!

Namaste.


	28. Reality, Part 1

_I have been happy, tho' in a dream.  
I have been happy—and I love the theme:  
Dreams! in their vivid coloring of life,  
As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife  
_Of semblance with reality, which brings  
To the delirious eye, more lovely things  
_Of Paradise and Love—and all our own!  
Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known._

– _By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 24 Part 1, Reality**

--

The waves crashed around her but she fought against it, taking deep breaths and swimming the fastest she could.

Kim heard someone else jump in the water and she looked quickly over her shoulder. Bonnie was having more trouble than her to get through the waves.

She swam towards the sailboat in the horizon, it getting bigger and bigger as she got closer and closer. She grabbed a rope by its side, breathing in heavily and pulled herself up on the deck.

"Bonnie!" Kim held down a hand that Bonnie took. She almost fell down the boat by the weight. But luckily Bonnie grabbed the rope too and joined her above the water.

"Frigging…" Bonnie wiped the water off her eyes. Her blonde hair was smeared against the back of her shirt and she shook her head. She held a gun in her hand and Kim realized why it'd been so hard for her to swim.

They closed in on the door leading to below. It sounded like it came music from there; it was muffled so she couldn't be sure.

"That sounds like…" Kim tried to find the right word, "an… orchestra."

Bonnie glanced at her, trying to say something with her eyes.

Kim shook her head in response. "What are you trying to –"

Bonnie sighed. And kicked in the door with all her force.

Down the ladder inside the cabin, a dark-haired girl with a face full of freckles pointed a rifle directly at them. Her eyes widened and she grinned at the sight of them, lowering her weapon.

"Desmond!" Kaylee shouted. "We're finally here!"

----

"I'll do it," Fox said quickly, not hesitating a second. He straightened up, trying to look far braver than he felt as he met the doctor's gaze.

Doctor Borden smiled faintly. "The procedure of donating bone marrow –"

"No!"

Fox turned to his mother. She'd crossed her arms, her fingers twitching after the want of a cigarette but her eyes were glaring into the doctor's, showing anger than Fox never was used to see as she always had been small, weak around him.

"I'm sorry," she said hoarsely, "but this is a family matter, we need to discuss this in privacy."

The smile was still there on the doctor's face, but now less honest and more reserved. "If that's not possible you can sign Matthew up in the waiting li –"

"Privacy," his mother snarled, ignoring the doctor's words completely. "Fox, come with me."

She held his arm hard, leaving him no other choice than to follow her out to the corridor.

"Mum…"

"Don't talk."

Fox was taller than her now, stronger, but while his mother and he had left the car without any seen injury – he still wasn't okay, neither was she and he never thought they ever would be, at least not with each other. Because when Fox was away, he still had the memories, but it was easier when he wasn't around the two things reminding him of his childhood all the time: his brother and mother.

So now, when he was here with her at the hospital it felt like his father would show up at any second. He hated how that made him feel. It made him weak. Made him easy to control.

When they were outside his mother lit up a cigarette. Fox wasn't sure if you were allowed to do that so near to the hospital, but he didn't say anything. Even though there were so many things he wanted to tell her.

"W-why?" he finally said, sounding small and pathetic in his own ears. "Matthew n-needs it."

"I know he needs it, that's why he's here at the hospital." She frowned, looking at the hospital with loathing. They could barely afford it, and Fox was right now practically living on nothing so his brother could stay there. "But we can't donate, that list sounds better… much better…" She inhaled slowly, putting the cigarette to her mouth again.

"I can!" Fox yelled. His mother almost dropped the cigarette on the ground.

"Fox –"

"You – it's my b-brother, your son – we… we have to. I'm an adult, it's m-my own decision." He shook his head. "If you don't want to help him t-then you're…" Seconds went as he tried to find the right word, it was always like this, awkward, something unsettling with speaking to her, "horrible."

His mother just looked at the hospital in silence. Maybe he'd finally gotten through to her, maybe she finally listened, maybe she'd realized that she loved her oldest son as much as she loved her youngest.

"Fine," she spat and his heart sank in his chest. "You go in there, and see if you match – because you will not. Here I am, trying to be a good mother and spare you the pain but you go and call me horrible!" She snickered.

"I…" He wanted to yell at her, for being irrational, ridiculous, for being so pathetic – for making him pathetic.

In the end, he just left her standing outside when he went to see his brother and talk to the doctor about the donation.

----

Desmond had for a short, hopeful time believed he was finally getting of the bloody island. He didn't care that those people – _survivors_ from the plane didn't know what one snowman said to the other – because now there were at least someone who could push the button and he could leave with the conscience that maybe, maybe the world wouldn't end.

It was one thing for everything to blow up and another thing for everything to blow up and being your own fault. And if they chose not to push the button – it would be their burden if everything ended up in flames.

The boat, the _Elizabeth_ was exactly where he'd last seen it. When he'd screamed at Kelvin and pushed him so his neck broke and he was alone, alone, alone. It'd been almost finished. Almost. But he hadn't cared that there still were some parts needing fixing, he just wanted to get the bloody hell away from there.

It had been brilliant to stand on the deck, a bottle in his hand while waving goodbye to the hell he'd been in the last three years. When he went down to sleep, he thought that it was the last time he saw it.

It wasn't. Because everything was a damn snow globe.

He'd stared in disbelief when he came up the next day. The sun shining irritatingly bright for his mood. Just a mistake. A mistake easily fixed. Next day it would be gone, gone, gone forever.

And the next day came and went, just like the day after that and the day after that and it went on and on and on and always, always when he got up the island was still bloody there!

Every day the same. He swallowed another bottle, turning on the music to its loudest so it would drown his thoughts and memories. He fell asleep when he'd drunken too much, ate when he couldn't drink anymore. If he remembered – he went up on deck and screamed at the island for _always being there._

It went the same and the same and the same.

So he was a bit surprised when a dark-haired, green-eyed girl with red legs crawled up on the boat.

"Stop! Stop!" she'd shouted when he held the rifle pointed at her. "I – I'm a survivor of flight 815! My… my name is… I know I probably look like that girl from _The Ring_ but – please don't shoot!"

"A survivor?" he'd asked, his eyes turning to her bleeding legs, how she could stand he had no idea. Yeah, hadn't those people – those people had been survivors. "What're you doing here?"

The Ring Girl stared at the rifle and he lowered it. Then, she'd looked into his eyes and collapsed.

Ring Girl's real name was Kaylee, and she'd been through something that in Desmond's ears sounded like a version of the Grimm fairy tales – the versions with blood and horror. And when she was done, when she'd told him of waking up alone and with the mother girl… Claire or Clairy their names were similar at least and seeing his boat – he began to tell his story.

It wasn't the easiest, at many points he felt like he should be drunk to tell it properly, but maybe now was the time so sober up. Ring Girl obviously needed his help, with her weird legs and all.

"You think we need to chop it off?" he'd jokingly said.

She stared at him like he was crazy.

He probably was.

"Your family must miss you," she'd said, taking a careful step, holding onto Desmond like he was her lifeline.

He got the same twisted pain in his gut at the thought of his family. "My father's… gone. Mother dead. Died when he gave birth to my little sis."

"Your sister is alive then?" She'd taken a deep breath, finally letting go to stand on her own.

He'd looked down, at the alcohol smeared floor of glasses and bottles dropped. "Ah yes, I hope so, haven't heard her in a very long time."

"Heard?" Ring Girl had turned to him, lost her moment of concentration and tripped.

He helped her up, not really focusing on her, his eyes looking past her at something else. "It's just a… We used to say so. Bit of a habit. She was blind and I… I was the one to take care of her." He smiled, finally looking at her who was standing up, determined to do it right.

"A girl at our camp says that too." She grimaced and leaned against the wall.

"You should sit down –"

"No, no I'm fine," she said but he could see tears in her eyes. "I had just begun to walk again…" She bit her lip. He knew, she'd told him of it. He though it was stupid that she'd gone on some bloody mission when she could barely stand up. And with the Hostiles kidnapping her friends… she was lucky to be alive.

"So, that girl at your camp," Desmond said, wanting to change the subject. He didn't want the girl to start crying and being a wreck – he was the one with that part.

"The blind chick, Lori, yeah she's kind of… uhm, let's say that if she was the one in this condition she would have defied all laws of physics and started flying."

The name startled him. Pressed an 'on' button in his mind and the headache he'd had from the drinking and the pain in his back faded until there was only one important thing. Hope.

"Lori?"

"Lorraine… last name…" Realization gripped her just like it had gripped him and she stood on her legs, all the sudden blind to the pain, "…Hume."

She stared at Desmond, looking for an answer in his eyes.

He nodded.

"No _freaking _way_._"

He was sleeping when he was awoken by Ring Girl playing his nice but now annoying music loud. He groaned, pulled the pillow over his head and ignored her tries to wake him up.

"Desmond, come on. I can stand now, see?"

Desmond didn't see. He was too busy trying to ignore her existence.

She finally left him alone when it came weird thuds form up above, probably just someone trying to board the boat. He rolled over to his side, blinked and stared at the wall.

"Ring Girl!" he shouted, realizing what was above them. Something shattered.

She yelled, though she sounded a lot calmer than she usually did, "Desmond! We're finally here!"

She'd said the people at the camp were reasonably freaked out. All Desmond saw was people going completely bonkers. A girl was having something that looked like an asthma attack, being carried by a skinny-looking guy and another one who immediately left her side as soon as he saw Ring Girl.

The guy pulled Ring Girl into a tight hug just a few seconds longer than for it to be just a friendly one and then pulled away, looking embarrassed.

"T-that's him!" A guy, who'd gone to greet the Asian girl – Kim stuttered at the sight of him. "That's the hatch m-man. Who was here b-before us!"

Desmond saw a bottle of wine on something that had to be their dining table. He tore his eyes away from it, looking around the camp for the sight of a very pale girl with brown hair.

Many people asked them questions, and Ring Girl went into a full explanation of what'd happened to her.

"Where is Lori?" he interrupted her, stunning some of the audience.

"Coming through!" someone shouted, for one second he thought it was Lori – they had similar accent but then he saw a little, blonde girl stand before him.

Desmond frowned. "Andy?" he asked carefully.

The girl looked like she was about to cry, then she laughed and pulled him into a quick hug. "Oh, you bastard," she said it warmly though, not looking the slightest angry at him. "Penny's been going mad, she's been looking for you all this time and – she wasn't crazy. She wasn't!"

The rest of the survivors seemed to think they were, the way they stared at them.

"Lori," Desmond repeated, he wanted to speak about Penny – he had so many questions but they had to wait, his sister was now more important, "where is she?"

"Lori? You…"

"She's my sister."

Andrea's eyes widened. "_The _Lori… Oh God… I had no idea she was your… She's gone, she's gone off on a rescue… killing mission."

A half-hour later, Desmond went into the jungle with a woman named Ana-Lucia, armed with guns, his mind filled with information from Andrea about a black pillar of smoke, to follow his sister.

Lori always thought she could run away, but Desmond was always three steps behind.

--

"You need to calm down," Sun told her with a gentle voice, putting the crushed eucalyptus under her nose to breathe.

It was not easy to calm down. Not when her whole body was trembling and she was so, so frightened and stressed.

Margo closed her eyes. She pretended by doing that everything would go away. That the guy by her side would stop looking at her, would stop making her feel so guilty. That the baby in her belly would also fade away, just a dream, nothing more. That the graves by the trees, lying in the shadows were only a figment of her imagination.

"Please." It was not Sun who said it, it was Zidler. So she laid back, took a shivering but functional breath and rested.

--

"I'm g-going w-with you."

"When you don't stutter you can come with us." Andrea knew it was cruel, but she only needed Kim to sail the boat to the Other's camp. She didn't need Fox to tag along.

Kim though, glanced at Andrea pleadingly. "He can come can't he?" she said, sounding like a little child.

Andrea sighed. She was really too confused for this. The man her sister had been searching for – going bloody insane for had right now appeared on the island and that was, very, very puzzling. She'd wished to go with him instead of Ana-Lucia, but then she'd thought about it while watching Desmond getting ready to leave.

She had her suspicions, and it would be better this way. To take Desmond's boat and sail by the shore until they reached the Other's camp. Just in case something was wrong.

"I'm going w-with you," Fox tried again, looking mad at himself. "I'm going with you."

"High five!" Kim yelled and they clapped their hands together. "Come on, Andy," she said, turning to her again, "the more the merrier right?"

"Merrier," Andrea sighed again, "sure. But do you know how to sail?"

"Of c-course," Fox answered like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Andrea hoped she'd made the right choice.

Kim skipped off to pack and said something about seeing how Margo was. Andrea already had a bag ready.

She still knew – thought that it was going to end one day, that one day the Others would storm their camp and they would have to run and then she better had to be prepared.

She needed water though. By the water supply Bonnie was standing, drinking greedily.

"Hey," Andrea said and took a bottle. Bonnie nodded slightly as an answer and continued to drink.

She knew most people had been avoiding saying a word to the woman since of what's happened. But what she'd seen from Bonnie she knew she wasn't just going to break down and cry because someone said word to her.

Suddenly she got an idea. "Bonnie!" she exclaimed, making her raise an eyebrow at the quick change of tone.

Bonnie took down the bottle, breathing heavily. "Yeah?"

Andrea grinned. "Me, Kim and maybe Fox are leaving on the boat, heading for the Other's camp."

"Why? Jack and the gang are one the way –"

"Yes, I know. But Bonnie, you know something's not right, don't you? The way they refused anyone else to come with them? And I did not exactly know Flor and Michael, but they are… well… Let's just say I would feel a lot better about the whole thing if there was a back-up plan. "

"So you're going," Bonnie replied simply.

Andrea nodded. "Yeah, we are, but here at the camp, how can you defend yourselves? A lot of you – us have been kidnapped, just recently Claire and Claret. And then there was that fire and all those missing people…"

Bonnie's face and tone were expressionless. "That sounds like the army talk."

"That is because it _is_ the army talk. Next time something happens – don't you wanna be ready? Don't you want everyone to be ready?"

Bonnie tilted her head to the side, looking at Andrea curiously. "Yeah?"

"Bernard knows Morse code, Libby knows how people think, Locke knows how to use a knife and you know how to use a gun. And I believe you know where Sawyer has his stash of weapons?"

Bonnie nodded slowly.

"See you when we get back." Andrea smiled again and left Bonnie to think of everything she'd said.

The small walk from the water supply to Fox's shelter was long enough for her to grow uneasily. Her thoughts went back to Desmond. Such a coincidence it was.

But Andrea didn't believe in coincidences, it was fate, it was fate for her and Desmond to meet here.

And she hoped it was fate for her and Desmond to return home – to return home to Penny.

"So you really know how to sail?" she asked as she leaned over the little fence-thing he'd built on one side of his shelter.

Fox looked up and then back to the notes he was gathering together. He nodded. "Yeah, I d-do."

Andrea was still staring at him with doubt.

He sighed when he saw her looking at him. "I do know, r-really."

"Are you just coming along to flirt with Kim? 'Cause this is serious, I don't want to see you two being lovey-dovey with each other when I'm trying to shoot bad guys."

Fox had his face turned down, but she could still see it become red.

"No," he answered and it was all he said. He took up the backpack and stepped out of his shelter.

"All right," Andrea said, "let's go!"

----

"Fox, stop acting like a fretting teen waiting for her date."

Fox tapped his foot on the floor anxiously. "I'm not f-fretting."

Matthew smiled feebly. "Sure you aren't."

Fox continued to tap his foot, the silence unbearable for him. He kept his gaze on the door, waiting.

"Fox?"

"Yeah?" Fox still stared at the door.

"Maybe… maybe you shouldn't do this."

His head turned around to face him. "What?" he sounded far more convincing now than when his mother had argued with his decision.

Matthew sighed and rested his head on the pillow, his face having one of those I'm-your-big-brother-and-know-better-than-you expressions. "I'm saying you don't have to do this."

"Yes, yes I d-do."

"No you don't." Matt sighed again and looked up at the roof. "Maybe this is it."

"T-this is it what?"

"Maybe it's time for me to… go."

Fox took a shivering breath. "It's about your l-legs isn't it? Just because you c-can't walk –"

"It's not about that," Matt said firmly, still staring at the roof intently. "It's not about the crash, or what happened after. It's about… before. Before all of that. I think… maybe… this is it."

Fox had a rising suspicion of what he was talking about. "Stop saying t-that –"

"I mean that now… maybe I can finally forget."

Fox knew what he meant, he really knew. The thought always came to his mind of times like special dates, dates of the days of his father's birthday, or that day he locked him inside the closet, or the day he died. And sometimes when he woke up from a nightmare, sweating and crying and forgetting for one moment that he was safe, thinking there was only one way to stop it. It happened at the most ridiculous time too – when he was out with a friend, being happy and suddenly remembering when Matt was happy, and how his father would always take that smile away.

But it was just a thought, like a wish you knew would never come true. Because even though he'd considered it, he knew he would never do it. And he thought it was only him feeling that way, he never thought that Matt… Not his brother.

"No," he growled. "Just for that I will d-do everything to save your l-life."

"Fox –"

"Matt."

They glared at each other for awhile.

"It g-gets better," Fox lied.

"No." Matt shook his head, almost like he was trying to shake the demons out of his head. "No it doesn't. Not for me. For a while I thought it would – then the car crash happened and –"

"So it is a-about your legs –"

"Can we stop discussing my legs?"

"If you stop pretending to b-be a martyr!"

"I'm not! Fox, seriously you are very, very annoying."

Fox mumbled curses under his breath. "At least I'm n-not suicidal… Not t-that suicidal."

"I'm not suicidal. I just want it to end… okay? The nightmares… the memories… And also, it's my choice, not yours."

"I'm your brother. I don't c-care. You have to live."

End. A closing word. The stop of the process.

It didn't matter who got the last word, he or his brother, because in the end it didn't matter. He wasn't a match. He couldn't donate.

And as it turned out – that wasn't the only thing that didn't match in blood.

----

"You planning on doing some reading?" Kim grinned widely and nodded at the journal sticking out of his backpack.

Fox nodded. "Brian will k-kill me otherwise. " He frowned and then turned his gaze back to the island in the distance.

"What is it?" Kim asked, following his gaze.

"Owen," he answered and didn't explain further as he went to teach Andrea how to rig the mainsail.

Kim's shoulders slumped in defeat without her knowing why.

As the wind took the sail, Kim waved slightly with her hand, not smiling as the camp went out of sight.

----

"So, who is it?"

His mother looked up; when she saw him she swore and searched her purse, fishing up another pack of cigarettes.

He sat down on the edge of the bench, not wanting to be too close to her.

"What do you mean?" she asked, trying to light it, but her fingers were shivering too much.

"Is it m-me or Matt?"

"I still don't under– crap!" She took the cigarette up from the ground, brushing the dirt off as best as possible.

"Mum! W-which one of us isn't yours?"

She met his gaze for one second and then looked away, sighing deeply.

"Both," his mother said after a second of hesitation. "You are mine, and Matt was your – his father." She chuckled hopelessly. "That's why he hated you and that's why I always loved you more than your… brother and that's why he's gonna die."

"No."

"Yes…"

He stood up. "No."

"Fox…" his mother said weakly when he rushed away from her, unable to see her – hear her lies anymore.

_I hate you,_ he thought,_ I hate, hate, hate you. I wish you were dying instead of him._

----

"HELP!" Owen screamed in the most dramatic manner she could, flailing her arms and collapsing on the sand.

She lay with her face down in the sand for awhile but no one came up to her. She stood up, brushed the dirt off her clothes and scowled.

"HELP!" she screamed again and once again collapsed down on the sand.

"Owen?" Locke said.

_Finally,_ Owen thought as he helped her get up on her legs. She looked at him with big eyes, hoping the bruise over her eye she'd made looked horrible enough.

"Owen – what happened to you? Where is Brian…and Wendy?"

Owen did a fake sob, putting her face in her hands. "They… the Others took them!"

Okay, it might have been over dramatic to throw herself in his arms, but how else was she supposed to do this stuff? It wasn't like the Others had pamphlets with 'How To Act Like You Haven't Gotten Your Friends Kidnapped 101' or 'You Have Been Assigned By The Native Population To Infiltrate Your Own People? No Problem!'

Locke took the tape out of her hand, really, she was wounded and he was focusing on a simple tape? He was going to pay for that.

"What's this?"

Owen smirked a little when his gaze was focused on the tape. "It says the hatch is fake."

--

Margo still pretended that if she kept her eyes closed long enough the world - the reality would go away.

"Margo?" someone asked, his voice penetrating the blanket she'd wrapped around her head. She knew she must look ridiculous but she didn't have any earplugs. And a blanket was good, it covered her eyes too.

The very someone pulled the blanket away, Margo, her face still down grabbed after it and it resolved into a tug o' war.

That someone won, forcing Margo so sit up, blink against the sun and face the world again. Except it wasn't really the world. Not on the island, on the island it was something surreal that always was on the edge between a dream and a nightmare.

Zidler sat next to her, legs knelt up to his chest and his cards by his side as always. Their gaze met for one second before she looked away.

"I heard," he said, making her look at him again, "that you should eat a lot of fruit when you're pregnant… I think…" He blushed and held forward a papaya.

Margo smiled weakly, taking it. "All we eat is fruit."

"I… I know."

Silence.

"So…" He cleared his throat awkwardly. "You and Wendy are both… you know…"

Margo shook her head. "No, only me."

"Only you and Wendy?"

"No just me."

"But Wendy –"

"She lied. She knows I'm… She did it for me."

Zidler looked down at the ground. "Oh…"

Margo nodded slowly, but he wasn't looking at her. She felt a lump in her throat and she swallowed hard to stop the tears. She made a strange sniffing noise and he looked up, seeing the silent tears that she hadn't been able to keep in run down her face.

"Margo? You're awake."

Margo wiped her tears away and tried to look like she hadn't been crying. Libby smiled not having noticed any of it.

"There's something I need to talk to you about," she said gently. "If you don't mind?"

"No, no it's fine." Zidler stood up, clearly avoiding Margo's gaze and Libby took his place.

Margo cleared her throat, watching him walk away, hoping her voice wouldn't shake too much when she asked, "What is it?"

Libby still had her smile on her face, but she looked a bit sad, like she was trying to keep her appearance up for her.

"Do you often have these kinds of asthma attacks? This bad?"

Margo shrugged. "I had my medicine before… Not now though. I just got my inhalers. Sometimes I had worse than others… but I always had help."

Libby sighed. "Back in the real world."

"Back in reality," she said to herself. "Why do you wonder? Are you like a doctor or something?"

Libby held up one finger. "One year in medical school. And I kind of know these things. It's good that Sun could help you."

Margo frowned, worried. "What would've happened if she couldn't?"

"There's no way to know for sure, Margo. But when you're pregnant – and got such a bad asthma like you do…"

"Is the baby hurt?" she asked quickly. Not daring to breathe.

"I'm going to be honest with you… It could be. Oh, I just wish we were off the island so you could get real help."

"So…" Margo swallowed, "so if I give birth on the island –"

"You're not going to give birth on the island," Libby said quickly, "people are here to save us remember? I wished they would hurry up though. But I think you should stay put. Not go on any island missions, take care of yourself, and everyone here can help you with that."

"Oh…okay," Margo said quietly. "Can I have a moment alone?"

Libby nodded, still looking very concerned as she joined Hurley by his tent. Margo could bet a thousand dollars that she'd told him everything. They looked ridiculously cute as they a moment later kissed.

She looked down at her belly and said in a motherly voice, "Your middle name is so gonna be Trouble."

"I thought the parents decided the name of their kid's together."

Margo looked up; Dom was leaning against a tree with an unhappy expression on his face.

"We're so gonna have the Planned Parenthood talk."

--

"Jack," Lori whispered to him, "no one's near right?"

"I am," Sean said, "but I can go away if you want."

"Yes _thank _you," she replied sarcastically, missing Jack's smile.

"What is it?" Jack asked in a normal voice, not caring to whisper like Lori. Lori grabbed his arm so they slowed down, further away from the rest of the group with Michael in the front.

"Something's not right." Lori's voice sounded severe, but she still had a hand on his arm and that was a bit distracting.

"What's not right?" he asked. Flor looked over her shoulder at them, her eyes narrowing when Lori leaned in to whisper:

"Shh, not so damn loud. Something's not right with…" She sighed and removed her hand. "I don't really know how to explain this, because the truth is really crazy so let's take another version? The deaths of Rosalie and Naomi, they weren't right."

"Of course they weren't right. That is why we are going on this mission."

"No Jack…" She sighed in irritation. "It's all wrong. I don't trust this. I don't trust _them._ Michael and Flor, their whole story… don't you think it's a little suspicious?"

"What are you saying?"

She shook her head to herself. "It's just not right. It's… it's like a fifth sense, sorry but we have to be careful." She bit her lip. "That's why I unloaded Mikey's gun."

"_Lori!_"

Lori had already skipped away to Allen's side. Jack sighed. She never changed did she?

Sean stopped and waited for Jack to reach his side.

"Jack," he said in a low voice. "We are being followed – don't turn around!" he yelled when Jack did just that.

He could finally see two shapes moving between the trees, but maybe it was just his imagination.

"Where?" he asked.

"There, just have your gun ready, on the count to three you shoot right there. One… two… three…"

Jack almost dropped his gun as Sean fired straight into the trees four times. Flor screamed, but Michael and Sawyer were quick to pull out their own guns.

"STOP!" a voice screamed. "STOP! IT'S JUST US!"

"Ana?" Allen's voice was shocked.

"You almost shot me!" she yelled, her fear fading away as she straightened her back – glaring at them. "What the hell!"

"Almost shot me too," someone else said, a man stepped out from behind a tree, a man Jack recognized, "you have to be more careful, brother."

Jack glanced from Ana to the man, confused. "Desmond?"

"DESMOND?" Lori rudely pushed Jack aside, her head turning to every direction.

The man, Desmond grinned widely, walking towards Lori with open arms. "Long time no see, little sis."

Lori reached out a hand, touched his face and threw herself into the hug. Her laugh was bright – genuine, something that wasn't often heard from her. "You're alive!"

"Looks like it," Desmond answered, still in her embrace.

Lori whispered, but Jack could still hear it, "It's been three years."

"I've been busy pushing a button."

Lori pulled away from the hug, her head bent up but not quite in Desmond's direction. "You… you were the man in the hatch…"

"Yes."

Lori sighed. "Well then…"'

Lori took a step back. Desmond looked confused. He looks less confused and more surprised when she punched him in the face.

"OUCH!"

"Lori –" Allen pretested vaguely. But Lori wasn't listening to any of them.

Lori's words dripped with poison, "Which kind of idiotic moron," she snarled, "applies for a sailing race around the world huh? Oh that's right you do!" she growled at the end, hitting him on the arm. Jack felt a bit sorry for the guy, he knew how that felt.

"And then you end up on this FREAKING island!" Lori continued to yell, her pale face earning a bit of red color. "Do you have any idea what I've – we've been through, seriously…" Her voice got lower, as she had to breathe more. "Penny was going mad and I – I was already mad and you're such a…"

"Moron?" Sean said helpfully.

"Yes…" Lori turned her head down, breathing hard. The others just stood around them, not doing anything but stare.

In the end, Lori put her arms around Desmond, who Jack realized was her brother, and whispered quietly – so that only Desmond and Jack who stood close could hear, "Love you... And if ever leave me again I'll shoot you."

--

There was a steady, easy wind; he'd wanted to be the one to be in the control of everything, as he obviously knew more than Kim and Andrea about sailing. But Andrea was intent that she could do everything on her own, so he let her. It was good she was a quick learner.

The notes in the journal confused him more and more. The Latin was very strange, as he'd told Brian – it was two versions, and he wasn't exactly very good at Latin to begin with and now to try to translate this… wasn't exactly easy.

"How's it going?" Kim sat down beside him, her hair blowing in her face because of the wind.

Fox sighed. "It j-just gets more and m-more confusing by the second." First they are on the i-island, then they're n-not. And then they're on t-the sea and then they're f-fighting a war. It's all wrong."

Kim took the journal from his hands and read out loud, "Hodie… ego… statua… more random words." She put it away. "Fox... what do you think it will solve? What do you think you're gonna find out in that?"

"The answer of the u-universe?" Fox tried carefully. Kim chuckled. "No, r-really…" he said with a sigh, "I'm bored."

Kim's lips curled up in a smirk. "You know," she said and scooted a little closer, "there are other ways you can… occupy yourself."

He blinked, confused.

Kim smiled against his lips when she kissed him.

"Bloody hell – Oi!" Andrea shouted. "When you're two are done making out –" A sound of something breaking came from her way, "Fox _help me_."

----

"Hello –"

Fox ignored whatever the man was going to say, stalking through the corridor while gritting his teeth, replaying the conversation with his mother again and again in his head.

The man gripped his arm, making Fox look at him. He was tall, regular-looking, wearing a doctor's coat.

"Fox Edwards right?"

Fox nodded reluctantly. The man released his arm, a friendly smile spreading on his face.

A very creepy friendly smile.

"I'm in a-a hurry." Fox got out of the man's grip. He turned around and almost ran away from him.

"Wait!" the man shouted and ran up to his side. Fox halted and sighed.

"W-what?"

The man's smile only got bigger. "My name is Dr. Ethan Rom. I – I've been following your research, I've read about the electromagnetism experiments you've done… And I must say I'm impressed."

"Uhm, thanks. B-but I have to –"

"I know you're in a hurry. But if you could just take one minute, I'm a part of a company, Mittelos Bioscience, I don't know if you've heard of us but… we're very interested in your work, here…" He held out a brochure, the words Mittelos Laboratories on the front page. "Read this, and when you're done let me know what you think, all right?"

Fox nodded shortly, taking the brochure and left to see his brother. He folded it out, saw the ridiculously bright, suburban pictures inside and snorted.

Hours later, Fox returned to politely decline the offer of joining them. Dr. Ethan Rom had only smiled again at that.

And said that he could save his brother.

----

Margo wasn't stupid.

She knew Dom loved Kaylee in _that _way.

She knew he never liked her.

She pretended she'd forgotten, that it was just one stupid mistake.

She hadn't. And it was also kind of hard to forget when you had a baby inside of you as a result.

She knew Dom was the kind of love 'em and leave 'em guy. She wasn't like that. She felt something for him.

And it didn't exactly make this any easier.

"Can… you like… stop scowling at me?" Margo almost winced at the burn of his gaze.

"Oh, I'm sorry. Would you prefer me to pick out a gun?"

Margo sighed, annoyed. "Stop it."

Dom raised an eyebrow. "You stop it."

"No you stop it."

He poked her arm. "Stop."

She poked him back. "Stop!"

He poked her one last time, avoiding her revenge by the simple act of speaking, "Why didn't you tell me?"

"That I was pregnant?"

"No that you're a girl."

They stared at each other for a while.

"Seriously," he said after the silence, "no, about the little mini-me you're gonna have."

Margo looked down, tracing a line in the sand with her finger. "It's not a mini-you."

"Junior me?"

"No… Dom, it's not yours."

Dom chuckled. "You expect me to believe that? Come on, how many other people have you hooked up with on this island? It can't be Zidler since yesterday he whined to me about how he was Duckie and I was Blane."

Margo frowned, not getting it. She swallowed, trying to get the lump in her throat to go away. "It's a one-night stand."

"Yeah, right."

"Is that so hard to believe?"

"You're not the type… I mean, well, you did with me but –"

"I swear that it's not yours. I had the symptoms long before you and I were together. And you're right, it wasn't really… It was a friend. A mistake."

"Friend's name?"

"Andrew," she quickly lied.

"Last name?"

"Hobbs."

"Hobbs?"

Margo nodded in answer, her heart racing rapidly.

Dom sighed. "You totally sure?"

"Yeah," Margo said and tried the hardest she could to not sound tearful, "totally sure."

"Okay." Dom curled his hand, like he was thinking of taking her hand or putting a hand on her shoulder. He cleared his throat. "It can't be easy for you."

"I can handle it," she said weakly.

"You don't have to do everything on your own." He smiled. "And if you need to talk to someone – well, trust me when I say I know how you must feel right now."

Margo smiled back. "Thank you."

He finally decided just to pat her hand once, before he stood up and left.

Margo waited until he had gone to Kaylee by a bonfire. Then she stood up and hurried over to the jungle, in between the trees until she reached the big rock.

She climbed up on it, refusing to cry until she was sitting on top of it. There, with her legs dangling off the edge, she let the tears fall.

--

"And they took them!" Owen had shouted dramatically, and the tear that had fallen from her face was sort of not so fake.

She wasn't heartless. She wished she hadn't been forced to do it. But she knew they wouldn't be hurt.

She clenched her teeth, pretended to be okay and acted like nothing was different after that scene when she'd told the survivors the story. That was the best way to deal with things. Be sad for a moment and then let it go.

So afterwards, when she sat down by Rosalie's grave and sang her a song, she let herself cry when she knew no one was watching. Then, when the song ended and Owen's voice was hoarse and her mouth dry she stopped. She got her time of mourning and now it was over. Now she was going to do something else.

Locke was watching the tape for the second time when she returned to the hatch. He wasn't able to hide his disappointment and anger in his face when she came into the room, looking at Dr. Wickman explaining how the whole thing they were in was a hoax, and looking at him. It looked like Locke's all hopes and dreams had been crushed just because of the video.

"You know what this means?" Locke said in a quiet voice, still looking forward even though the video had ended. "That this – everything is freaking USELESS!"

He threw his crutches across the room, standing up and glaring at her – at everything around like it was their fault.

"Locke…"

"Everything – everything I've done… Form Brian getting hurt… Boone being gone… I…"

"Maybe it's not a hoax," Owen said, not believing her own words.

There was not even a glint of hope in his eyes when he looked at her. "I guess there's only one way to find out."

Owen nodded to herself. "Whatever it is – I'm sure it will be stupid and suicidal. So… I'm totally in on it."

Darkness was settling in, sweeping over the island with the stars being lit on the sky.

On the beach Eko was building on the church. Ellie was playing with a doll by his side, singing to it.

When suddenly the words she sang changed to wicked sneers and she began to swing the doll back and forth like a pendulum. He stared at her, confused, telling her to stop, but she just continued to swing the doll.

"Drop, drop, drop."

And then Rosalie had been at his side, putting a gentle hand on his shoulder and told him softly that he had to push the button.

Whatever it takes.

Dom had seen Eko passed out by the church, Ellie desperately trying to wake him up. He'd in the end thrown water on him, and he'd blinked, looking at him with big eyes, saying: "Sometimes it's no coincidence."

The timer went off.

Locke and Owen stared at the computer, none of them pushing the button.

"Now we will be free," Locke said.

Owen's smirk faded, and her eyes flickered, suddenly scared.

In the jungle, by a small creek the rescue group was resting. Some of them didn't think of this mission as rescue, only death and revenge.

Ana though, as she whispered to Jack and Lori about her suspicions and of the words Andrea had spoken to her, thought it was a trap. Thought Michael and Flor were lying – thought they were smart, thought they were murderers.

On a freighter, not far away from the island a guy named Frederic Phelps was released from his prison, with the order that he was now finally going to the island.

_And maybe, _he thought as the beautiful, blonde woman escorted him up to the deck and the wind from the sea never had felt more beautiful, _maybe I will find her._

--

**Author's Notes:** The finale next chapter guys.

Your reviews are made of awesome, thank you so much!

Namaste.


	29. Reality, Part 2

_I have been happy, tho' in a dream.  
I have been happy—and I love the theme:  
Dreams! in their vivid coloring of life,  
As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife  
_Of semblance with reality, which brings  
To the delirious eye, more lovely things_  
Of Paradise and Love—and all our own!  
Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known._

– _By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 24 Part 2, Reality**

**--**

"Do you want a Dharma nutribar?"

Sawyer glanced at Allen, shrugging as an answer. Allen sat down beside him on the fallen tree, giving him the nutribar anyway.

Allen took a deep breath, but Sawyer said quickly: "If you're gonna give me a heart-to-heart talk let me know so I can fire my gun at ya."

"I'm not gonna give you a heart-to-heart…"

"Good," Sawyer growled, taking a piece of the nutribar.

By the other one of the bonfires, Ana-Lucia, Lori, Jack and Desmond sat.

"So you took out the ammunition of his gun?" Ana-Lucia asked, fingering with her own weapon. Desmond glanced at it from time to time, like he expected her to fire it.

Lori nodded proudly.

Desmond grinned, tearing his gaze away from the gun. "Good job little sis."

Jack stared at Desmond over the fire. "You barely know what we're talking about." Lori turned her head, not looking at him but he knew that if she could she would glare.

"Yes, you're right. This whole Hostiles deal…" He gestured with his hands. "It's confusing. But I know my little sis has done something great, so good job."

"So, what?" Jack said, turning to Ana, "Andrea is going to…"

"Light up a black pillar of smoke when she's reached their camp," Ana answered with a tired voice.

"And why exactly would she do that?"

"Duh," Lori said, making Desmond chuckle, "'cause Michael and Flor are lying of course, compromised by the Others, something like that. It's good that you two came here, now we got the upper hand."

"I don't think they're lying," said Jack.

Ana took a shivering breath. "Okay, Andrea told me this was the part where I would punch you, but I'm gonna pass and instead tell you the obvious. They are lying. I use to be a cop all right, and now when I know it – I can see it clearly. How they acted so strange when they returned. How they were the ones to survive that man's attack. How they just wanted you – and only you to come along."

"It doesn't mean that –"

"Hey."

They all looked up startled at Michael. Jack was worried for one second that he'd heard their conversation, but he looked indifferent.

"Desmond, Ana, can I have a word?"

"Of course." Ana just sat on her spot.

"Alone?" Michael said between his teeth.

"Anything you wanna say you can say here, brother."

"All right, _brother_," Michael replied. "I just wanna say thanks – for coming here with an update on the situation, you know with Claire and Claret. But really, you don't have to come along. We're good."

Ana curled her lips up in something that probably was meant to be sweet, but came off more devilish."We can help."

Michael smiled just as poisonous back."You don't have to."

"Well, we're already here, it's the least we can do, Mikey." Desmond smiled, Lori too at the use of the nickname.

Michael pursed his lips. "So you're not going back?"

"We're not going back."

Michael exhaled deeply. "Okay."

When he left, Ana arched an eyebrow Jack's way.

"All right, all right. A little suspicious then."

Further in the trees, where the flames from the bonfire was just a faint flicker of light, Flor stood, leaning against a tree and shaking with quiet crying.

She wiped the tears away with her hand, but there only came more and more and more.

"It's okay if you're crying," someone said in a low voice.

Flor whirled around, and saw Sean's face in the dark.

She didn't deny it, only wiped away the tears again furiously, avoiding his gaze.

"Hey," he said gently as she began to cry again, walking over to her side and placing a hand on her cheek.

"I'm sorry." She sniffed.

He still had his hand on her face. "For what?"

She didn't answer him. She just leaned in and kissed him and tried to forget everything.

--

"Why are you not you pushing the button?"

Owen looked up; she was playing around with the other equipment in the room, the props to the illusion. Eko stood in the entrance to the room, his 'Jesus stick' (as Charlie called it) in his hand.

"We're gonna let it run down to zero," Owen answered. "That sounds like a lyric, you got pen and paper?"

Both Locke and Eko ignored her. The beeping sound was a bit unsettling after all. No wonder she was getting second thoughts about the whole thing.

She began to play with two wires, not considering a second that it could be dangerous.

Eko's gaze burned into Locke's. "Why are you going to do that?"

Locke grabbed the tape from the table. "This is why, watch it."

Eko eyed the tape carefully. "No, there is no time. I have to push the button."

Locke stopped him from reaching the computer, stood in his way. "Listen to me Eko, it's all a lie. Owen found this tape and this whole thing." He waved with his hand at the walls around them. "This whole thing is a hoax. An experiment. It was meant for lab rats, people to be studied while they were in here, believing they were saving the world. But they weren't – we aren't. So now, we're not going to push the button."

Eko smiled, but it wasn't a friendly, happy one. "I am going to push the button. For it is fate."

"I believed that too, but now I know there is no such thing as destiny."

Eko shook his head, almost in mocking and walked past him and in front of the computer, typing four.

"Don't do it!" Locke shouted, grabbing his arm.

"Locke…" Owen stood dropping the two wires on the floor. Eko swung the stick at Locke and Locke fell back on the floor.

"Guys!" she shouted. "Do you hear that?"

Both Eko and Locke stopped their destiny-testosterone-fight and listened.

"_8… 7… 6…_"

Owen and Locke looked at each other, Locke nodded to her and Owen nodded back to say she understood.

Eko rushed to the computer, pushed in the numbers and walked out into the corridor.

Owen smirked.

"_5… 4… 3… 2… 1…_"

--

The sun that met Bonnie in the morning was annoyingly bright.

Because just like when Rosalie's funeral had been, it was too happy, didn't fit the circumstances.

Almost all of their people were kidnapped.

And Rosalie was dead.

She swallowed hard and pulled her hair up in a ponytail. Tried to look determined as she called out for the survivors to wake up, there was going to be a meeting.

She leaned against the dining table, looked around at the group that began to form around her.

Finally, when she saw the last one join them she took a step forward, straightening her back and made sure that her eyes were glaring into theirs.

"Yesterday some of us left to get back the people we've lost and avenge those that have been killed," she said. Her voice steady and her gaze firm.

"Yesterday we also found out that even more than we thought have been lost, Claire, Claret, Brian and Wendy. It seems that every time we turn our backs and look away they are right there. It's like they're watching us, always, those Others. And there's absolutely nothing we can do to strike back!" She slammed her fist against the table.

"At least," she said, "that's what they want us to believe."

In their silence she continued to explain about the army, why they had to do it, and how they would learn.

--

"Andrea! Fox!"

"What is it?"

Kim pointed at the land in the distance. "Look!"

She handed Andrea the binoculars and she looked through them in bewilderment. "Wow," she said quietly. There, on the island was a big, giant foot.

"It only has f-four toes," Fox stated the obvious.

Kim's eyes were round in wonderment. "And the rest of the statue is missing."

Andrea gave back the binoculars to Kim. "This island just gets weirder and weirder doesn't it?"

----

Fox screamed.

He tried to get his hands free but they were tied closely to something and he couldn't get it off. His eyes were met by a dark an eerie green light and he couldn't move. He couldn't move at all. He was back. He was back again in the closet and he would never get out.

"Whoa, calm down!" a familiar voice said, grabbing his hands and tying up the knots. "We had to tie you down for the ride. Calm down."

Fox looked at his side. There Ethan Rom stood, a wicked smile on his face, seemingly unaffected to the wreck Fox was.

"W-what…"

"Come on." He helped Fox down on the floor; he was swaying on his feet, barely being able to stand up.

"Are we in a submarine?"

Fox turned around; a woman was leaning against the wall, looking like she'd also been drugged like him. Her hair was long, a bit frizzy and she was wearing high heels. Something that Fox knew wasn't exactly the best type of shoes in a submarine.

_Submarine. _

"Come on," Ethan said again, still with the smile.

"I'm Fox Edwards," Fox introduced himself, happy that he didn't stutter.

"Juliet," the woman replied, looking worriedly at the ladder Ethan had just climbed up on. "Do… do you know where we are?"

Fox smiled faintly. "N-not really."

"Oh, okay." She took the first step.

When she was up on the top he heard her exclaim, "Wow."

And he knew why when he climbed up on the dock.

The heat – it was surprising. The big mountains in front of him, overgrown with just green trees – green plants – green everywhere. The dock went into the land, a broken sign at the end, the waves slowly rocking in around the dock's sides, bluer than any water he'd seen.

It was beautiful.

"Hello."

Fox tore his gaze from all the wonder around him to a man, walking towards them.

"Hey," Juliet answered faintly, her face lit up just like his in awe.

"It's wonderful isn't it?" The man smiled. "Hello Doctor Burke, Fox Edwards." He nodded to them. "My name is Benjamin Linus."

He held out a hand. Juliet was too busy staring at the sea to notice it, but Fox took and shook it.

"I'm really looking forward to work with both of you, as you see –" He turned around, gesturing a hand at the island " – We got something quite special here."

----

Margo put the beret on her head, it didn't fit her exactly. And it surely wasn't practical to wear on an island. But she liked it.

"Isn't that Wendy's?"

Margo swung around. Charlie was carrying Aaron in his arms, rocking the little baby.

"Uhm, yeah, yeah." Margo didn't take it off.

"You know Jack and the others are gonna get her back don't you?"

Margo nodded. "Yeah, I know. Why are you saying it to me?"

"Well, since you were friends I figured you might need some support. And I figured you were friends since she lied for you, saying she was pregnant when she was not. I hope you're gonna pay her back for that when she returns."

"She suggested I would name the baby Wendy junior."

Charlie nodded slowly. "Or, if it's a boy you could name it Charlie. Then the little fella will have good chances to become famous."

Margo laughed and Charlie smiled.

"By the way, Zidler's is absolutely _torturing _all of us with talk about you. So could you like… go over to him and tell him who the father is? I think Dom knows but he is the only one Zidler doesn't complain to so…"

"Why would he talk about me?" Margo asked a little too quickly.

Charlie grinned wider. "Now, why would he?" he said before he walked away, humming on _You All Everybody_ to Aaron.

--

The blast doors screeched as they went down in the hatch. Owen raised her hands, shouting something that couldn't be heard over the loud sound.

"No!" Eko's scream was heard from behind the blast door. "John! JOHN! Let me in!"

Locke looked away from the door to Owen, who sat in the chair, twirling her hair with a smug smile on her face.

"How did you know how to do it?" he asked.

"How I knew how to do what?"

"Make the blast doors go down."

Owen shrugged. Honestly, she'd just played with the two wires; she was just as surprised as him. "I… I just experimented."

Locke still had distrust in his eyes, but seemed willing to let it go. "You're good at experimentation."

"Even better at singing."

"JOHN!" Eko shouted, banging his fists against the blast door. "LET ME IN!"

--

"Ooh, excellent." Kim took the bottle of the cupboard, opening it up.

"What are you d-doing?" Fox came up from behind her.

"Drinking, there's alcohol here." She smiled at him. "Want some?"

Fox looked at the bottle, his eyes suddenly turning sad. "No."

"Why not?"

Fox looked away. "We shouldn't be d-drinking when we're on a b-boat."

Kim guessed by the look on his face that there was a lot more to it. But before she could ask what it was – he left.

----

"Knock, knock." Juliet smiled and stepped over the threshold into the house – _his_ house.

He'd left the door open. Why, he didn't really know. But everyone at the island – they were just too happy, smiling and trusting each other endlessly. Okay, maybe not, but it seemed that way. And maybe he sort of had some insane hope that someone would barge into the house and steal his belongings. To prove that the world was still horrible, just like the people in it.

"Hey," Fox answered.

"Can I sit down?" Juliet gestured to the sofa.

"Of – of course."

Juliet straightened out her skirt and took a deep breath. "So," she said and smiled nervously, "this is all really strange isn't it?"

"An understatement, b-but yes. R-really strange."

"Did you meet the therapist?"

"Harper?" Fox nodded. "She w-was…"

"Scary," Juliet said quickly.

"I was gonna say n-nice actually."

"Oh." Juliet blushed, twisting her hands together, her smile disappearing.

"Ben's nice," she said after a moment of silence. "He gave me flowers."

"And all I g-got from him was this house, bummer."

Juliet smiled again. "This whole place, it's not really what I expected."

Fox tilted his head. "W-what did you expect?"

"I – I don't know. Not being on an island in the middle of the pacific for starters. Ah, only six months left."

"S-six months?"

"How long are you gonna stay?"

Fox shrugged. "I d-don't know."

Someone knocked at the wall. Fox turned his head around and saw Tom stand in the doorway.

"Hope I'm not interrupting anything," he winked at Juliet who blushed again, "but Goodwin is here, he wants to show you the Tempest."

"T-tempest?"

"It's a place where magic happens," Tom joked. "Come on, he ain't got all day."

----

"And that's why the old Godzilla is way better than the remake," Dom finished, chewing on a Dharma cookie, damn those things were addictive.

Kate and Kay rolled their eyes in unison, a technique they've learned from spending so much time with him.

"I still think the remake is better," Kate mumbled under her breath and Kay laughed.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Ellie said, stealing a cookie from Dom. "But I think Dom's right."

Dom ruffled her hair. "Good girl."

"Eko!" Ellie shouted, dropping the cookie in the sand, jumping up and down. "Look, he's back!"

Eko stumbled out of the trees, holding his stick in one hand and his eyes glaring around at the camp. He staggered towards them.

"Eko, you okay?" Kate asked.

"Dynamite," Eko simply said.

Kay looked confused. "What… What do you mean by dynamite?"

"I know where it is," Dom answered slowly, not really believing that this was now happening, but far back in his mind excitement rose. "I can take you to it."

Eko nodded.

"Take him to what… What's going on?" Kay shouted after them as they left for the jungle, unable to follow because of her legs.

Kate did run after them though, catching up to them by the tree line.

"Eko," she said, "what's going on?"

"I need to push the button."

Kate's eyes widened and she turned to Dom for an answer. Dom just shrugged and followed Eko into the jungle.

--

It wasn't just her imagining things; everyone was really looking at her. Well, more scowling really.

Margo put a hand on her belly, feeling the little bump there and swallowed.

Bonnie was teaching a group down by the water how to point and shoot. Zidler was there she saw to her surprise, it looked like he was having a great time, (even though Bonnie glared at him from time to time) and he and Hurley were mostly fooling around.

"Margo!" She turned around and saw Bernard, Kaylee, Ellie and a few other people by the dining table. "Would you like to join us?"

Margo shyly strode over to them. "What are you doing?"

"We're learning moss code!" Ellie shouted happily.

Bernard grinned. "Morse code, actually. Bonnie said it could be useful. And we got two open spots since Dom and Kate left."

"Two?"

"For you and the baby."

Margo smiled.

--

Flor kept glaring at Michael, and Michael kept avoiding her gaze. They all noticed it. And they all had their own theories why.

"And then Inman," Desmond said to Lori, "he went out of the hatch. But this time I followed him, and then I found out he'd been lying. He'd been lying about everything. He'd been using me as a puppet. Going out every day to work on _my_ boat, the _Elizabeth_ while I stayed and pushed the bloody button."

Meanwhile, Allen was trying to discuss with Sawyer, who was quiet what he thought the Others really were. He said he thought they were aliens. Even though he'd only a day before said they were soulless bastards who all deserved to die.

"We're being followed," Sawyer muttered to Allen.

"What?"

"Just – just keep smiling, Baloo. Got your rifle ready?"

Allen nodded wearily, unsure if Sawyer was just messing with him or was earnest.

"All right. In five seconds we're gonna raise som hell, you in?"

Allen nodded again, holding his rifle in a harder grip, just in case. And if it was true – if those Others were in the forest now and he fired at them – he could kill them.

The thought didn't please him as it did before. It should. It should make him excited. Happy. Gleeful that he could punish them for what they did to his daughter. But it didn't.

"Five."

Sawyer fired three straight shots between the trees. It came too soon, the loud bangs and the shocked screams, he just ducked to the ground, praying that none of the bullets would hit him.

Desmond immediately pulled Lori to the ground and before Jack could see where they were shooting at – Sawyer had gotten one down.

Allen frantically rose to his knees and fired a bullet into the woods, missing by far.

"He's getting away!"

Jack ran over to the man on the ground. Allen got up to his feet and hurried after him. There was no question about it, the man was dead.

"Come on!" Sawyer shouted. "We have to follow him! Allen –"

"No!"Ana yelled, stunning Sawyer who was already crossing the creek.

"What do you mean no?" Sawyer spat, gesturing for Allen to come along. "He's gonna warn the rest of his people we gotta –"

"I said no!"

Allen stopped in his tracks and turned to look at Ana.

"Are you crazy?" Sawyer shouted. "We have to –"

"It doesn't matter okay?" Ana screamed at him and closed the distance between them – staring right into his eyes. "They already know we are coming."

"Ana…" Jack said in warning, but she ignored him, turning around to face Michael who was clutching his shoulder – staring at the body.

Allen looked from Ana to Sawyer. "What do you mean they already know?"

"Why don't you tell them Michael?"

Flor's eyes widened, her eyes flickering between them.

Michael just stared, caught off-guard. "What are you talking about?" he said, his voice shivering.

"Stop lying!" Ana shouted, taking a step towards him. "You know exactly what I mean!"

"I…" Michael looked at Flor who shook her head faintly, taking a step back as the others got closer.

"Tell us the truth, Michael!" she spat.

"Tell us what?" Allen asked, feeling like he'd missed something. Flor was getting more and more upset but no one was noticing. "What's going on?"

Michael glanced at Allen. "I don't know –"

Ana grabbed his shirt and pushed him up against the tree, her eyes glaring into his. "Tell us the TRUTH!"

"Ana…" Jack said again. "Just let go of –"

"TELL US!" she screamed again.

It was like something finally broke inside of him. Michael closed his eyes, not fighting against her anymore. "I'm sorry, but it was the only way."

Ana let go of him and took a step back, still staring at him furiously.

"They – they gave us a list."

Flor inhaled sharply, but everyone's eyes were on Michael as he continued to speak:

"A list with your names on it… They said, we had to bring all of you, and if we didn't… they…" Michael swallowed. "I had to do it so I could see my son again!"

Ana took the gun from him, he didn't resist. He just looked at them pleadingly, asking for forgiveness without words.

"It was you wasn't it?" Lori said weakly, all the edge on her voice gone. "It was you who let that man – in the hatch go?"

Michael looked down, nodding slowly.

Allen realized it all, it took him over with shock and he couldn't even get mad, just so weak with everything. "You killed them," he said softly, feeling like his knees would give up under him. "You killed Rosalie and Naomi." He swallowed. "You took my daughter."

"Did you?" It was Jack. He was looking at Ana, who actually smiled at him, as confirmation for something that Allen didn't know.

"We had to." Michael looked away, like he truly regretted what he'd done. "I… You have to know… Rosalie was a mistake. She wasn't mean to – she just came into the room – we didn't have time to think…"

"You killed her."

Everyone turned to Sawyer. His eyes were dark. His face restrained like he was trying to hold all the emotions in but was failing.

"You killed Rosalie." His voice was low. Filled with underlying hatred.

"I'm… It's my son –"

"YOU KILLED HER!" Sawyer grabbed Michael by the collar, pushing him up against the tree again but now with a gun at his head. "YOU KILLED HER!" His fingers were shivering, wanting to fire straight into his head.

And Allen, he wanted it too.

"No, he didn't."

Sawyer turned his head around. "He just confessed!"

"No." Sean looked to his side, his eyes full of regret as he gravely said, "He said 'we'."

At his side Flor stood, looking at Sean with silent tears running down her face.

--

"So we're all gonna die? I never believed in that button nonsense."

"It is not nonsense," Eko answered Kate, following Dom who was leading them through the jungle. "Pushing that button is of outmost importance."

"Dom, you can't seriously believe all this?"

Dom didn't answer her. He looked around at the trees. "It's around here somewhere…"

"You've watched way too many movies," Kate stated. She wasn't too happy about that all the sudden her brother and Eko could communicate with their minds.

Somehow he got from the shocked expression on Eko's face that he needed dynamite, Eko though, at least seemed a little surprised that he didn't even need to convince Dom to show him it, but Dom acted like he knew that this would happen… somehow.

"We don't have much time, Dominic," Eko reminded him.

"Yeah, yeah hold your horses. It's… here."

"Whoa." Kate stopped Dom and Eko from taking the dynamite right away. "Slow down, it's very unstable. You gotta be careful." Oh God, she couldn't believe she was going to help them. "Let me," Kate gently took the piece of dynamite up, very slowly.

"Ah," Dom said and smiled, "it's the whole blowing up deal otherwise right?"

Kate glared at him, still not getting over the fact that no one of them had really explained the whole hatch deal to her. "Right."

--

"Andrea!" Kim shouted. "Look, it's it!"

"Give me the binoculars, Fox." Andrea said. Fox was staring out at the land, his eyes dim and his burrows wrinkled into a frown.

"Fox!" Fox still didn't seem to have any contact with earth, so she grabbed them from him anyway.

"Finally," she said as she saw the weird rock formation. It was a rock wall – but there was a hole in it. Almost like it was made that way. "We're here."

Fox turned around and walked away from them, not wanting to look at the island ever again.

----

Thus far, the whole place… seemed kind of nice.

It was strange though as Juliet said, he couldn't deny that. Mittelos Science was just a cover company, and the island obviously was not in Portland and the whole deal with the mothers dying and protecting their home…

He just tried not to concentrate on that so much.

He stood on the same dock he'd arrived to when he first came to the island, staring at the small sailboat by it. Ben stepped down on the dock, smiling at him.

"What do you think?"

"W-what do you mean?"0

"About the boat of course, isn't she a beauty?"

To Fox, it looked like any other boat in the world. Not even the name of it was special, _Sarah._

"I-I don't really know."

Ben looked at him like he expected Fox to say something. And Fox would've happily done so, if he'd known what he was supposed to say.

"Uhm… Why did you w-want me here?"

"Do you know how to sail, Fox?" Ben asked, like he hadn't heard what Fox said.

Fox cast a worried glance at the boat. "Not really."

"Well then, come onboard."

Fox carefully (he didn't want to fall in the water _again)_ climbed up on the deck. He looked around at all the ropes, and wondered what in the world he was doing here, talking to the leader of them about sailing.

"Aren't w-we supposed to head out for t-the Hydra today?"

"Yes we are. The rest are going to take the main boat but I thought you and I could sail with this, it will take longer but that's all right?"

Why would Ben want to sail with him?

Fox suddenly got a visual image in his head of Ben throwing him overboard, lying and saying that it was an accident.

But Ben was the leader. And they did what the leader said. So if Ben wanted him to learn how to sail… he would have to sail.

If Ben wanted him to jump overboard, he would have to jump overboard.

"No, that's the starboard," Ben said a long time later.

Fox could now happily jump overboard, he was that frustrated. Maybe this was a punishment they got when they'd screwed something up. He knew that taking out the entire barracks' electricity was bad, but it was an accident.

"Ben," Fox said, trying very hard not to sound too angry, "why am I here?"

"To learn how to sail."

"No, why j-just me?"

Ben smiled. "I like to get to know all the members better."

Fox still had the bad feeling that something was about to happen, that there was an underlying scheme to all of it. But Ben's smile was honest, even though Juliet always would describe it as creepier than the Joker in all of Fox's comics.

"Beer?" Ben offered.

"I don't drink."

"Ah." Ben opened the can. "It's because of your father isn't it?"

"How d-do you know about my father?"

Ben took a sip and then smiled again at him. "We do our research when we recruit new members. You could say – we know almost everything about you." He laughed, but Fox still had the bad feeling that he was actually telling the truth.

"Actually, I can understand." Ben said and put the beer away. "My father was too someone… who drunk a lot." He sighed and looked out over the sea. "But life goes on, you got to get over it. Stop dwelling on what mistakes your parents did and focus on the present."

"I thought Harper w-was out therapist."

Ben chuckled again. "Yes she is. She says you have refused continuing seeing her, why is that?"

"I don't have anything to say to her."

"Despite your past?" Ben searched his gaze, but Fox refused to meet it.

"You s-said we should focus on t-the present."

"Yes, I did."

----

"What are you gonna do?" Kate asked and grabbed Dom's arm as Eko placed the dynamite below of the blast door.

Dom shrugged her off. "Eko's gonna try to blow it up."

"I-I know that, but why are you helping him?"

Dom met her gaze. "Sis, can you please just trust me on this? We have to push that button. And if we can't then…" He turned away. "Please, just trust me for once, Katie."

"But… what if you hurt them?" Kate turned to Eko. "What if you break the computer again?"

None of them answered her.

"Locke?" she shouted. "Can you hear me? Owen? Dom and… Eko is gonna try to blow this open with the dynamite! Can you hear me? He's gonna blow all of it up!"

No one answered her from the other side either.

"That's just…" She shook her head. "What if Locke's right? What if it's all really fake?"

Both Dom and Eko stared at her like she was the crazy one.

"Fine, if you wanna blow yourself up, that's fine with me, I'm out of here." She got more irritated when she walked away that Dom didn't shout to her to come back.

"John!" Eko shouted. "This is your last chance. Let me come in, let me push the button. Or I'm going to detonate the dynamite!"

"No!" Locke screamed from the other side of the door.

Eko took a deep breath and Dom handed him the lighter.

Kate turned around. "Guys…" She saw Eko make a cross in the air. "Maybe… this is a very narrow area…"

Eko lit the fuse.

"Dom!" Kate shouted, she darted over to his side and grabbed his arm. "We gotta get out of here, NOW!"

"Kate, you don't under –"

"I understand we're gonna get blown to pieces!" She yelled.

She heard the explosion from behind. The heat that closed in on them. She heard her brother scream her name and she jumped to take cover and then –

--

"They really blew it up, Oh dear Lennon they really blew themselves up!"

"We don't know that." Locke sat in front of the computer, playing around with a pen.

"I think they did. It's quiet." Owen ran her fingers through her hair, feeling sweaty and all the sudden guilty. "We should open the doors up –"

"No. They are fine."

"How do you know that?" All the sudden it was too real. The sort of harmless glee she'd gotten from telling the truth about the hatch had suddenly turned into something much more serious. "They could be seriously injured!"

Locke looked up. "And since when did you start to care about them?"

"I'm not heartless, Locke."

Locke chuckled.

"What's so funny?"

"I just never saw you as the worrying type. First thing you do when returning after Wendy and Brian's kidnapping is to help me – do this. Not to freak down, collapse in tears –"

"Oh, I'm sorry. You want me to do that now?" Owen snapped. "You know I can cry. But unlike other people, I prioritize. And no one needs a weeping little girl right now so I'm sorry I don't fit your standards."

"I never said you should cry. I just said I didn't think you cared."

--

"It looks abandoned," Kim whispered to Andrea. They were hiding behind a rock, looking at the seemingly empty village before them. Andrea held a rifle in her hands, ready to fire. This was the camp Michael had been speaking about.

"Never judge a book by its covers, honey." She carefully stepped out of their hiding place, leaving Kim to clutch Fox's hand in worry instead.

Andrea looked inside one of the open yurts, it was completely empty. She waved at Kim and Fox.

"Come on," Kim said and still holding hands they hurried over to her side.

"I gestured for you to stay," Andrea hissed.

"Oh, I thought you meant for us to come," Kim answered with a small smile.

Andrea opened another door, turning around but there was no one inside there either. And not in the next one and in the one beside that it was also empty.

Kim slowly walked towards a door in the hill, on it was the familiar 'Dharma' sign but with a door in the middle of the octagon.

"Kim…" Fox whispered. But Kim threw the doors open.

It was just the hill, not even a room. The door led to nothing.

"It's fake," she said, turning around to Andrea and Fox. "It's all just a stage."

Anna gripped her rifle harder, taking a shivering breath. "So he was lying."

"Or… maybe they've left," Kim said, not believing it either.

----

Juliet sighed. "He really creeps me out, Fox." She was sitting on a chair by the dinner table, a glass in her hand.

"Well, he's k-kind of nice."

"Nice?" Juliet laughed and took another sip of her drink. "He stalks me, and you, don't tell me you haven't noticed."

"You're drunk."

"I'm not drunk." Juliet put the glass away. "I wish I was though. Then maybe I would think it was just my imagination."

"W-what do you mean?"

"You know what the creepiest part about him is? It's not that he follows me around all the time, or his giant, round eyes. It's how he treats you."

"I-I still don't understand…"

"Come on, Fox! He's so nice to you, and not in the good way nice, but in the way he gives you… preferential treatment. You know that Ivan accidentally leaked a little of that gas in the animal cages? No harm was done but he locked him inside Room 23 for _two days._ Two days Fox! You go and test your electromagnetism stuff and one of the polar bears die and he gives you a pat on the back and says: 'It could've happened to anyone'."

Fox wasn't clueless. He knew this had been going on. He knew that for some reason Ben had taken him under his wing. And it used to freak him out – but now he'd just accepted it.

Not that he was going to admit it.

"You are so drunk." He took her glass away. "F-for your own good."

He helped Juliet to her bed. Locked her door behind him and crossed the barracks to get back to his own house.

His house.

He'd been on the island for three years now. And while Juliet got drunk he didn't do anything at all to celebrate – or detest the day.

It was not that he didn't miss his family. The thought of Matt almost made him want to drown a bottle of alcohol himself. But he just accepted that he wasn't going to see them again anytime soon.

"Oh, hey Ri-Richard." Fox almost walked into him.

Usually, Richard would greet him with a smile. But now he looked at Fox solemnly. "Hello."

"You g-going to see Ben?" He'd mentioned something like that to Fox earlier on the day.

Richard nodded. "Yeah, something like that. We got something to discuss."

"What?"

Richard chuckled but it wasn't glad. "You."

Weeks later Fox messed up again. And this time it wasn't really his fault. It'd been Goodwin's. But Ben had looked directly at him, and this time when they went to the Hydra Island, he got to visit Room 23.

It was all of his nightmares merged into one.

And after that he was always, always afraid of Ben.

Thinking about the nightmares, he sat in the couch silently. He could hear the rest of the people in the book club discuss – argue distantly. But he was too caught up in his own mind.

"There's no metaphor. It's by-the-numbers religious hocum-pocum," Adam said after claiming that the book wasn't even literature.

Amelia smiled slightly. The woman had the patience of a saint. "What do you think, Fox?"

Fox blinked, looking like he'd just woken up. "Uhm… I… I agree with Julie."

It didn't seem that Juliet and Adam had heard them.

"No metaphor?" Juliet snapped, leaning forward with the book gripped tight in her hands.

"It's science-fiction!" Adam said, waving with his own copy and almost hitting Stephen with it.

"And since when was –" Juliet begun to shout. But her shout was abruptly interrupted by the walls starting to shake.

Fox flew up, looking startled around. The floor underneath them vibrated. It almost felt like an earthquake. What if – the Tempest – Oh God, what if it was his fault?

"To the doorways!" Juliet shouted, taking Fox's arm and dragging him with her. "Everyone, the doorways!"

The shaking ended as fast as it came. Surprised yells could be heard from outside and they all followed Adam out.

Ben walked over to the middle of the grass, looking up at the sky.

Fox followed his gaze, and what he saw was something that could barely be described. Something no human should see. Something that shouldn't happen.

A plane in the air broke apart, crashing down on the island.

"Goodwin," Ben said quickly, seeing the smoke whirling up in the distance, "did you see where the tail landed?"

Goodwin tore his gaze from the sky and nodded. "In the water, probably."

"Run and you can make that shore line in an hour." Ben turned around. "Fox, get up there to that fuselage."

Fox exchanged startled looks with Juliet.

"There may actually be survivors; and you're one of them," Ben continued, like he hadn't noticed the shocked expressions of their faces. "You're a passenger – you're in shock – come up with an adequate story if they ask. Stay quiet if they don't. I want lists in three days. Go."

"_Ben!_" Juliet yelled. "You can't send Fox out there, he hasn't got the right training he's not –"

"Would you like to go instead of him?" Ben interrupted her.

Juliet looked down at the ground. "Uhm… uh…"

"Didn't think so," Ben said quietly. "Ethan." He turned to the man on his side. "You go with him. Make sure he does what he's supposed to. Go!"

Fox shook his head at Juliet who nodded sadly.

When he ran after Ethan towards the plane…

He hoped no one had survived.

----

"How did you know?" Jack asked her.

"Know what?" replied Ana.

"That Michael and Flor had been compromised."

"I didn't know for sure," she answered. Michael and Flor were walking in the front; all of them had their weapons out pointing at their backs. "But I scared him to confess. Working as a cop makes you learn things."

"Well, I'm sorry for doubting you."

Someone cleared their throat behind him.

"And I'm sorry for doubting you too, Lori."

"Jack!" Allen shouted. "Look!"

They turned around, far away in the distance, over the trees a black pillar of smoke swirled up in the air.

"What is it?" Lori asked her brother.

"Black smoke, Andrea's signal. But... that's miles from here, brother." Desmond turned to Jack. "We are going the wrong way!"

"Where were you taking us?" Ana yelled at Flor.

Flor looked down at the ground, looking like she was about to cry again. "We were taking you to their camp –"

"Stop it, Flor." Michael sighed. "There's no use to lie anymore. They're here."

Sean swung around, his gun pointing at the trees surrounding them in the clearing. "Who's whispering?"

Whispers filled the air but they didn't see where it came from. Sawyer was just about to release the trigger when the fell to the ground – a dart in his neck.

"RUN!" Jack screamed. Desmond grabbed his sister's hand and they began to flee from the scene. Flor and Michael bent to the ground, covering their heads.

Jack reached for Ana's hand but a dart hit her on the leg and she fell over in the grass. Allen fired two times into the trees, collapsing on the ground and shivering in spasms as another dart hit him.

Sean tried to carry Allen. "Run, Jack!" he shouted.

Jack had just come up to Desmond and Lori when a dart came from nowhere and hit Desmond in the back, he fell over and Lori knelt down by her brother. "Des!"

"Lori, come on!" Jack grabbed her arms and tried to make her stand up. A dart flew by his ear, almost hitting him.

"No, Desmond… wake up! No!" she yelled as a dart hit her neck.

Jack stood up and fired his gun, hoping to hit their attackers before he picked Lori up in his arms and started to run again. She was scarily light in his arms, but she was shivering and her eyes were closed.

"Hold on," he said to her and stumbled, tripped over a rock. But he couldn't' stand up again. He looked down at his leg and saw a dart there, he took it out, tried to stand up but it was too late.

He saw people… heard whispers… everything was a blur… now everything was black.

--

"Hello? Are you guys alive? Dead? Please answer!" Owen yelled, her voice was getting hoarser and hoarser, but she just wanted a confirmation that they weren't a pile of dust.

"Hey!" someone shouted back.

"Oh, praise you – me, whatever. Are you all right?"

"Not really! Eko is out and Kate's… You have to open the door!"

"Are they badly hurt?"

There was a moment of silence. "Yes!" Dom yelled.

"I think you're lying!" Owen shouted back. Locke chuckled behind her.

"Yes, but you have to open the door! You don't understand!"

"Enlighten us, please," said Locke.

"Okay, you know there was a guy named Desmond living down here in this evil lair right? Only it's not evil, it's like reversed, he was actually saving the world. And I know you don't think that." It sounded like Dom muttered something like 'idiots' under his breath. "But he was. There was an incident here and all of that is true. The button is true. And if we don't push the button everything will end like if they hadn't been able to blow up the meteor in _Armageddon._ And we actually got proof."

"What kind of proof?" Owen and Locke asked at the same time.

"Us, we are the proof."

Owen glanced at Locke who looked just as confused as she felt.

"What?"

"We are the proof."

"I don't get it!"

"On September the 22nd, the guy Desmond failed to press in the numbers and push the button. So everything went insane and our plane, well, it went boom and crashed on the island. When he didn't push the button – our plane crashed. Don't you get it? It's all real!"

"How do you know this?"

Dom didn't answer.

--

Jack blinked and squinted against the light when the hood was pulled off his head. Lori was shivering slightly by his side, and he wanted to tell her that they were on a pier, that they were all okay. He saw Desmond, Sean, Ana and Allen also tied up and gagged on the other side of her. They looked at him, like they wanted answers, but he couldn't give them any.

Flor and Michael were standing, none of them bound. Flor was shivering more than Lori was, but she wasn't crying. Michael watched them all. And Jack hoped that when he looked into his eyes that he saw all the hate he was feeling.

He turned his head around and saw a boat come up to the pier. Ana straightened her back, trying to see over their heads what was going on and Jack met her gaze. A look of worry passed between them before he focused his stare on the man climbing out off the boat.

It was him. The man they'd captured. And with the way every one of the Others were looking at him – he was their leader.

He strode up to Jack, bowing his head. "Hello, again," he said calmly, like he was talking to them over a cup of tea.

He frowned slightly at the sight of Desmond and turned around.

"Well, then," he said to Michael and Flor. "Let's take care of business, shall we?"

--

"Dom," Kate groaned and rolled around on her back. She blinked, her ears were ringing and it was dark around her. She struggled up on her feet and leaned against the wall. "Dom!"

She stumbled over the broken furniture and rubble on the floor.

She touched her own arm, it was bloody. Lights sparked above her head and she ducked, leaning down to Eko's side.

"Hey, hey Eko? Are you all right?" He was passed out, so of course he couldn't answer her. "Wake up!"

Far away, she heard the faint sound of the timer going off.

"Dom!" she shouted and left Eko's side, stumbling through the tunnel. "Dom!"

Dom stood up; he'd been sitting by the blast door and ran over to her. "Kate, you okay?"

"No," Kate answered in a shivering voice. "I… my ears…"

On the other side of the blast door Owen was walking back and forth, twirling her hair and biting her lip. "What if what he says is true?"

"It's not."

"What makes you so sure?" Owen spat.

"He's lying."

Owen stopped and looked up at the timer; it had reached down to four minutes. "He sounded kind of convincing to me."

"His story, how would he know all of that? No, he's lying."

"We have to push the button."

"No." Locke stood up, but he was still by the computer. "You saw that tape Owen! You know that this is a lie, that this is just a cruel hoax. It's not real!"

"I don't believe that anymore." Owen ran over to the keyboard and typed in the number four.

"Don't!"

Owen pressed in fifteen. "I have to!"

"No!" Locke grabbed the computer and slammed it against the floor.

Owen put her hands over her mouth, shivering in shock. "Oh… no… you…"

"It isn't true!" Locke looked at her.

"But, what if it is?"

"What happened?" they heard Dom shout from behind the blast door.

"Locke destroyed the computer!" Owen shouted back.

She heard someone else speak in a low voice, maybe it was Kate, but it could just as well be Eko.

And then Dom screamed, "Open the blast doors or we're all gonna die!"

"If I do that are you gonna kill me?" Owen asked Locke in a grave voice.

Locke shook his head. "No, I will not."

Owen walked over to the two wires and began to rub them against each other; soon the blast doors screeched and went up.

She hoped Dom knew how to save them.

--

This was not really how Dom had planned to spend the day.

He had great plans before, it involved wine and Kaylee, but now it was all just dreams. But not like that dream he'd had in the night. The dream that wasn't really a dream but a memory. A memory of something that hadn't happened yet.

He left Kate by Eko's side as soon as the blast door went up and rushed into the room with the bookcases.

Owen came in front the other entrance, her hair in a mess and her eyes big and horrified.

Dom glanced at her before he started taking out books from the shelf.

"What're you doing?" Owen asked.

"_Our Mutual Friend_ – it's a book. I have to find it."

"Why?"

"So I can save our asses."

Owen walked slowly up to his side and began to search through the books her too. Her silence surprising.

"Dom!" Kate stumbled into the room and stared at him throwing books over his shoulder. "What the hell is going on?"

"The end of the world."

"Stop joking around! You're acting – why is it so important to push the button? What does a book have with it?"

"Everything."

"Dom –"

"Katie, I love you little sister, but you're annoying as hell." Kate huffed at his words. "Can you please shut up and help me find the right book?"

"Is it this one?" Owen handed him the worn-out book.

Dom stared at it for a moment before he opened it, a key slid down in his hands. The key.

"What's that?" Kate asked in a high voice.

"That," he said and held it up, "is a key."

But it wasn't just a key, he knew that. He held it hard in his hand and Owen and Kate followed him into the computer room where Locke stood, looking at the timer that was going down to one minute.

Dom knew what he was supposed to do. And it freaked him out. Maybe there was still a chance he didn't have to.

But when he saw the computer on the floor, he knew there was none.

The timer reached down to one minute, and the alarm sounded higher.

There was no other option.

"What are you doing?" Owen asked as he ran his fingers over the floor until he found the grate and pushed it open.

"I'm going Harry Stamper," Dom answered and climbed into the hole but didn't get far as Kate grabbed his wrist.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, Dominic?"

Dom looked up at her sadly. "I'm gonna blow the whole thing up. So you have to get out of here, Katie."

Kate grimaced like she always did when she got confused. "Blow what up? Dom… How did you know where the key was?"

"I just knew. Please, Katie let me go."

"No," she growled, holding on tighter.

"I have to do this," he almost pleaded.

Kate shook her head. "No you don't have to. You're gonna blow up something and I guess you're involved in that too."

"_Kate._ It's okay. I'm a murderer. My life ain't worth much."

"Me too."

"No," Dom said and shook his head, "you're good."

He smiled weakly. A tear spilled down Kate's face.

"Uhm… can you tell… Oh God, I can't believe I'm turning into a cliché but – uhm, Kaylee… you know…" Dom clenched his teeth.

Kate nodded. "I know."

She released the grip of his wrist. And with one last grin Dom disappeared into the dam.

The timer reached zero.

"_System failure. System failure."_

Eko sat up slowly, trying not to get too dizzy. There was a loud alarm ringing, and a voice repeating 'system failure'. His eyes widened when he realized why. When he stood up he had to duck again as the forks from the kitchen flew towards him and to the magnetic wall.

"What the –" Owen's words resulted in a scream as she was almost hit by a knife, but Eko had pushed her out of the way just in time.

"It wasn't fake, it wasn't fake, it wasn't fake," Owen repeated. She pulled her hair back and mumbled to herself. "It wasn't fake."

T´he walls shook, the floor trembled. The air around was filled with things flying towards the wall.

Owen ran past him, avoided the washing machine and disappeared out of sight.

Eko ducked and managed to get into the computer room. Locke was holding the table, shaking and squinting against the metallic objects that flew and broke all around. It was chaos.

Eko looked up at the timer. It was red and black with hieroglyphics. The metal around it crumpled like paper.

He turned to Locke again, not mad, not angry, just shocked.

Locke stared at him, fear clear in his face. "I was wrong," he shouted over the turmoil around them.

Dom crawled through the narrow tunnel until he reached the fail-safe mechanism. He opened the lock – the word 'CAUTION' met him and he smiled weakly at that. He inserted the key into the hole with just a moment of hesitation.

"Going out with a bang!" Dom grinned at his words, then his smile faltered. His life wasn't flashing before his eyes. Things didn't go in slow motion. The noise was getting unbearable to his ears. Everything was too real. Too present.

He took a deep breath.

"Time to face destiny."

He turned the key.

_Famous last words._

_--_

_The world is ending._

It was a thought that crossed many minds as the sky turned brighter and brighter, the painful, groaning sound louder and louder.

_Now we're gonna die._

Was another thought that came after the first as the sound threatened to break their ears and there was no way to escape it.

_What the hell was that?_

Was the third thought when the noise and the glow faded.

At the beach, Ellie ran over the sand towards the big square thing that'd fallen from the sky. When she inspected it closer, she saw it said 'QUARANTINE'.

--

"Michael, Florence." Ben greeted to the both of them, but then his gaze turned to Michael only.

"Your son is in that boat." He nodded at it. "You are free to take it and leave."

"Wait… what?"

"I meant what I said. We had a deal and we're now going to fulfill it. I suggest you leave right now."

Michael looked at the woman on his side. "But what about Flor?"

Ben glanced at her. "You didn't follow your end of the deal completely so we're going to do the same. You came back without one of the person's one the list, Rosalie and returned with two that weren't. Unfortunately that means that Florence will have to stay."

"But…" Michael protested.

"Now leave before I change my mind and force the two of you to stay."

Michael looked at Flor who was not looking at either at them but on the boat.

"Go," she said. "You can still save your son."

"Flor…"

"Go!"

Michael nodded and ran to the boat. Flor looked away, but they could all hear Walt shout in happiness at the sight of his father.

Ben nodded at a black woman standing by Desmond's side. She removed the gag from his mouth and Desmond inhaled deeply.

"You, Mister Hume are free to go back to the camp."

"What?"

She tied up the knots around his hands. "Go back. Your job is to tell the rest of the people there that they can never come here."

"I'm not going without my sister."

One of the men pointed a rifle at Lori, smirking.

"If you do not go," the woman said, "we will hurt her. Go."

Desmond put a hand on his sister's shoulder, she nodded and he walked away from them.

Jack stared at Michael when he drove the boat away from the pier, and Michael stared back. Now there was no asking for forgiveness in his eyes.

A hood was pulled over his head, and again there was only darkness before his eyes.

--

"What was that explosion?"

"The child – Ellie said Eko was asking for dynamite."

"Dynamite can't do that sort of thing, the whole sky turned violet."

"I thought it was more white than purple, really."

Margo heard the survivors discuss the earlier events when she crossed the beach. She was still shaken up from it, still expecting the ground to vibrate like it'd done before.

Dom and Kate still weren't back. Owen was gone too. Wendy was kidnapped. Aaron was in Charlie's arms, his mother gone.

Sometimes the world felt horrible.

"Aliens." Margo flopped down beside Zidler by one of the bonfires.

He looked up surprised. "What?"

"Aliens, I think aliens did it. They've finally invaded earth. And that big flashy thing, that was their spaceships. And the violet thing was their laser beam when they beamed up the president."

"And the shaking?"

Margo grinned. "They were playing _You All Everybody _with intergalactic mega sound."

Zidler laughed quietly, but he still had that look on his face – she couldn't place it. It wasn't sadness, or betrayal.

"So," he said and cleared his throat awkwardly, "who's… uhm… who's…"

Maybe it was disappointment.

Margo searched her mind for the fake person she'd come up with. "Andrew… Hubbs… Hobbs, I mean. He's the father… or not. He's not really you know but biologically I-I…" Her voice trailed off when she saw something that was close to a smile on Zidler's face.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing."

She poked him on the arm. "Tell me."

"I… I thought it was Dom's that's all."

Margo had to restrain herself from screaming, hormones really were scary. Why would Zidler think it was Dom's? She didn't need a reminder that the father of her child was in love with someone else and would never like _her._

But then something else came to mind.

"Then why were you so nice to me? When you thought it was Dom's?"

Zidler looked down, pretending to be immensely interested in the sand.

Margo's eyes widened. Her breath got caught in her throat.

She felt so stupid when she realized why.

She did the only thing she could to make it right.

She moved closer to him and he looked up. She leaned forward, looking into his eyes, and she was scared, terrified.

She hesitated.

Zidler didn't when he kissed her.

--

He laughed as he looked down at the land beneath them, the trees, the wondrous hills and mountains. All the beauty.

The woman at his side didn't laugh; she even glared at him, like she was angry of him to be happy.

But he was happy, it was stunning, how could anyone not be overjoyed by the wonderful sight of the island?

The sound of the wind and the helicopter drowned everything else. But he was sure that if he was closer to the island, closer to the jungle, he would hear the amazing sound of all the life in there.

"We are here on an important mission."

"But it's so brilliant!" He laughed again.

"What is that noise?"

He stopped laughing, looking around at inside the cabin. The helicopter lurched and he was thrown to the side. "What's going on…?"

"It's malfunctioning!"

The sound became even louder and he covered his ears, outside he could barely see the trees and the island anymore. Everything as getting whiter and whiter…

"It's going down!" someone screamed but he couldn't hear who.

"Here, Frederic." Someone handed him a backpack when he realized what it was he stopped covering his ears, putting it over his shoulder.

The noise started to fade.

"WE'RE GOING DOWN!"

The helicopter door opened.

And he jumped down into the jungle he'd admired.

--

**Author's Notes: **Awesome. The Freighter folk are here.

The next chapter won't come until, well, about one to two weeks. But don't worry, on the day of the season six premiere I'll post that special, with some hints for those of you who over-analyze about the next season.

And so, I beg of you that in the future don't talk about season six in the reviews. At all. Don't even mention you cried. A lot of us don't have the chance to see it the same day as everyone else, for an example us in Sweden, so please no spoilers!  
(And, ahh! So excited!)

And guys, you are wonderfully, brilliantly, crazily, awesomely awesome. Thank you for your reviews!

Namaste.


	30. Season Six Premiere Special

**Season Six Premiere Special**_**  
Messages from a Bottle  
**_

**TO THE PRESS**

Dear fans.

Yes, you've heard it right. I'm alive.

I'm sure it was your confidence in me that made me survive the plane crash. Without it – maybe I would also have burned down.

This really makes you see life in a new light, hopefully under neon ones at my next concert called: _Survivors._

I hope you all bought my CDs in memory of me. Otherwise I'll haunt you.

Love,

Owen

**TO ZIDLER'S FAMILY THAT IS MAYBE KIND OF AWESOME**

Hey Mom, Dad, Elsie, Charlotte, Uncle Richard, Aunt Joyce. Oh, and Hazel.

I can't believe how hard it must've been for you to live without my presence in such long time. I feel for you. Except for Hazel.

I am very glad to inform that I am not dead! At all! Not even a little!

It was a bit freaky though. Plane crash and all. Many people were hurt but I managed to save most of them. And we who survived we're sort of good, we got a camp, tents and food and that's good. I guess. There's also people kidnapping us. That's also freaky. But we got a guy here who can hunt boars so that's a plus too. (Elsie: Boars are animals that are like pigs, but furrier and with these weird horn things and they like to eat meat.)

But there are great people around here. Like Margo she's awesome. People here appreciate my magic tricks and NO ONE CALLS ME MONTGOMERY PROMETHEUS. I win! You lose Hazel!

I miss you a lot. I hope you're all all right. And that you haven't been crying too much. But you have been crying, right? I would be extremely disappointed if you haven't. If you haven't I'm gonna do an Owen and haunt you. And yes, she's famous or something and I'm sure Hazel who likes bad music has heard of her.

I'm fine.

(NOT MONTGOMERY!!!)

**TO NATALIE TYLER**

Dear Natalie.

I bought you this really cool, expensive gift for your birthday. But it got lost in the plane crash. When I come back, and get loads of money from suing Oceanic, I'll buy you a necklace with the money I haven't given to charity and Green Peace.

I hope you haven't worried so much about me. 'Cause I'm kind of okay.

Oh, Zidler reminded me that I should tell you how we have it here. It's horrible, there's these people We have it good. We could be worse. Don't worry.

Love you more than love.

_Margo_

**TO CARMEN REYES**

Mom.

You were wrong. Hurley did know me. It's this brother-sister-connection we have. He didn't hate me. He didn't say I wasn't his sister. He accepted me. You were wrong.

He's really happy we've found each other. And I'm really happy too. And when I come back, I hope we can all be a family. A real family.

Don't give up hope on me.

I love you both.

Wendy

**TO ROBBIE THIMBLEBERRY**

Grandpa,

I can _b_arely hold a pen. That's why S_o_me of the things in ere are mis_s_pelled. It' s hard to write. Ive been… Im okay can't just hold a pen so E**a**sily.

All limbs are in place. Got _t_wo eyes. So I'm pretty okay.

Don't know if I can come back though.

But _ju_st remember to _f__**e**_ed the she ep and _as_k for help on**c**e in a while and things will be Okay!

Very, very much love from Claret

**TO DAMIEN HALIGAN**

Damien.

I didn't realize you suffered because of me

It wasn't my fault it was dad's... (the rest of the sentence have been erased, some words can be faintly read as 'sorry'.)

I made your life miserable and I know I can never make up for that

I'm sorry.

I'm alive though. I think. It's complicated. And I hope that when I'm rescued – _(the words have been scribbled out)._ Nothing can justify what I've been.

Your brother, Brian

**TO AVA AND KYLE. CHILDREN OF BONNIE MCQUEEN**

Ava and Kyle.

Hey, it's me, your mother Bonnie. I'm alive, and I'm okay. I survived the crash – it wasn't easy. As you imagine. But I'm all right now. I hope your daddy has taken care of you, and that you're okay, and that you have been doing your homework!

We got a nice camp here. But it ain't any hotel resort –I can't wait to get home.

I get so sleep under the stars. I know you don't get to see them often, just mostly a glance up at the darkness above and nothing more. But when I come back, we have to just take a night out and go and watch them. There's a lot of things we have to do… I know I haven't been around much. I know you say it's okay.

But it's not. I love you. And when I come back we're gonna do everything together, I don't care about anything else – acting – it means nothing compared to you.

You can be very happy that when I come back, I'll come back with Charlie Pace's autograph, and Owen Chauncey's.

Much love,

Mom

**TO SAM HARWOOD**

Sam.

I don't believe I get to say this but – I'm alive!

Allen.

**TO THE BURTON FAMILY**

Dear Silvia, Paul and Reggie.

This is Rosalie. I am alive and well despite what has happened to us. I thank the Lord that I survived it all, it was a horrid tragedy and everyday is a struggle.

Sawyer and I are together. And he's been taking good care of me like I know Lita would do if she was here.

I know the words must worry you. But don't. Lita is not with me on this part of the island, neither is our daughter. But I know it in my heart that Eva and Lita are safe. I know they are not gone. Even if they aren't present at my side at the moment.

I do hope we will get rescued. But I will not leave before I've found them again. Please, I beg of you to not stop and worry about us. Take it with you that even if we don't come back –

We'll always take care of each other.

_Rosie_

**TO AIDEN EVANS: ONLY HIM. **

Dear Aiden.

I know we haven't talked. I know you don't like me very much. I know you don't believe me. But you're my brother – nothing changes that… I hope.

I guess you want to know how I am. And I'm… honestly, I'm not okay at all. I just want to get away from here. I don't care if I get sent to jail –

I just want to see you.

Everyone is sugarcoating their stories of what've happened here. Don't wanna upset their families and close ones. But I'm gonna tell the truth.

I can't stand lying anymore.

We all crashed here on this island. I and two other fugitives were in captivity by a marshal. The marshal, and the two other fugitives died in the crash – I survived. We thought we were going to get rescued.

But we weren't. And people began to realize that everything – that the island wasn't normal.

Rumors are that a man here, Allen Harwood saw his daughter in the jungle and followed her to the caves, some of us moved there.

In that time, a man had disappeared. Sawyer. A few days later – people started looking for him.

He was found.

But two of us – a pregnant woman called Claire and the famous Owen were kidnapped.

Kidnapped by some people that have been here before us. Owen is back, Claire's not.

It's not easy. It's hard. Very hard to survive. A woman lost the use of her legs. Almost everyone lost someone – something.

And I realized something else when I was here.

You're right Aiden.

I am a killer.

_Kaylee_

**TO LOS ANGELES, LOMITA ST, 316**

José

This is a letter I should have sent you a long time ago.

I'm out. I can't be a part of this anymore. And now I got enough money and knowledge to put you in prison forever.

**TO OCEANIC AIR**

Oceanic airlines,

When we return.

We're so suing you.

_- The survivors of flight 815. On behalf by Charlie Hieronymus Pace and Lorraine Hume. _


	31. Application for Others

**Application for Others**

Yup, that's right, I want other Others. Keep in mind that I won't confirm that your character has been accepted until they appear in the story – and that might take a long, long time. Think the Freighter folk.

As always, I want unique, awesome characters. I want to know if they're loyal to their superiors, if they are like Juliet and want to leave, if they know the secrets or think that they're still in some version of the Dharma.

And guys, don't bombard me with chicks please!

You can send in as many characters as you want.

The Form:

Name:

Nicknames:

Age:

Origin:

Appearance:

Personality:

Friends:

Enemies:

How they came to be with the Others:

Past:

Do your character believe in Destiny?:

What is your character's favorite book?:

Occupation:

Anything else?:


	32. A Dream Within a Dream

Is all that we see or seem  
But a dream within a dream?

_- Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 25, A Dream Within a Dream **

--

Fire rained down on her, the walls closed in. The roof broke and in came water. Water that drowned the scorching flames but rushed into her eyes – making her writhe and scream, a soundless scream that didn't reach her ears even though she felt that her mouth was open.

So she ran, mindless because of the water, but then she couldn't run anymore, as her legs were nothing more but dust. Whispers, voices echoed in her head and they were coming from the water, twisting her mind with their words cruelly – but how could she hear? When her body was nothing but ash. When karma had finally gotten her? The phrase 'an eye for an eye' echoed. And another one that might have been from her voice:

_God loves you as He loved Jacob._

"Jacob…" she breathed, her eyes flickering and opening slightly. Still scarred by the nightmare, she saw the blurry image of a light yellow wall.

"Good, you're awake," someone said, their voice echoing and sounded like it came from far, far away.

But when she sat up, her throat hurting with every intake of breath, she saw that the person speaking to her was leaning against the wall.

It was raining, but there was a roof above her head and walls around, she frowned, trying to clear her mind from the drugs they must have put in her.

"Who… who are you?" The question was familiar; she'd been in this situation before. But this time it wasn't Juliet's icy gaze that met hers – but warm, dark eyes.

"Name's Ivan. And you are Florence Bluth." He seemed pleased at the fact, extending a hand.

Flor shunned away from it. The dripping sound was still heard from behind but she didn't dare to look.

He sighed, let his hand fall to his side. "If you wanna stay alive you might wanna consider being nice, it might make shooting you a lot harder."

"Where are they?" she spat, glaring at him. "Sean, Lori – where are they? Where have you taken them?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I said they were all living in a candy land would you?"

"What? No."

He laughed at her disgusted tone. "All right, then there's no point in answering your questions. I know Juliet was pretty easy on ya, but the rest of us – well, we take it more seriously. But in the meantime…" He walked over to the long line of lockers, taking a towel of one of them and threw it in front of her. "Take a shower."

"I won't take a shower. Where are they? What have you done to them?"

He chuckled. "Let's make a deal, I'll let you know where… hmm, let's say Jack is if you do as I say, deal? Oh, stop scowling at me. I haven't done anything, certainly not _murder._"

Flor couldn't help but gasp.

"See you later when you've taken that shower, Florence."

Flor took up the towel from her feet, gripping it hard, twisting it, like it was a neck she was breaking.

--

It was complete darkness around him. He wasn't sure if he had his eyes open or not, or if he was blind, if this was what Lori saw – didn't see every day.

He struggled up to his feet; his body aching when he almost tippled over, trying to find a wall to steady himself against.

"Hello?" he whispered out to the nothing. But no one answered him. He took a careful step forward, then another one, and another one in more security as he tried not to think about what monsters that might be hiding there.

He walked face into a wall.

The lights turned on around him, casting a dim, cyan glow over him and over the room he was in. He touched the wall – the glass in front of him. He looked up, seeing chains hanging from the roof.

"Hello!" he shouted, banging a fist against the glass, but it didn't break. "Anybody there? Hey!"

The door on the other side of the glass opened, and a woman stepped into the room, looking at him as she walked right up in front of him. The only thing keeping them apart was the glass. Her lips pouted like in a bored teenager's, even though she looked much older than that. She wore simple clothes, nothing like the rugs the Others had worn on the pier. Her brown hair had the same color as her eyes, and her lashes were dark and heavy.

She blinked several times quickly, like she'd gotten something in her eyes. But her expression was still indifferent.

"What's up?" she said after awhile.

He stared at her. "What? Let me out!"

"No can do." There was no cheekiness in her voice, it was just plain.

"Where are my friends? Lori?"

"I can tell you where they are."

He waited for her to continue, but she just blinked rapidly and he was surprised she could see anything if she kept her eyes closed for so long.

"But I won't," she said after a long moment of silence. "I'm just here to tell you, Jack, that we're sorry for your loss."

She turned around and began to walk away.

"My loss?" Jack shouted after her.

She kept a hand lingering on the open door, and glanced at him. "Yeah, the loss of Rosalie. We're offering you our condolences."

"Who – who are you people?"

"I'm Diane," she said in her monotone voice. "The rest are just normal human beings, you should try that, being normal. It can be nice sometimes."

She closed the door behind her.

--

The light reached his eyes even though they were closed. With a groan, he rolled over and buried his face in the soft pillow, his right hand trailed after the alarm clock that kept ringing in his ears.

Finally, he found the off button and there was a nice, morning silence once again. He let himself relax, his body felt bruised for some reason and his throat was dry, immediately he tensed again. He needed some water. It felt like he hadn't had any in days.

He groggily sat up in the bed, looking around at the room. It was bright, with light yellow walls and pleasant furniture, very clean though, nothing like his room back in Maine. He missed his room, he missed his home, the plane crash really had changed a lot…

_Plane crash._

He grabbed the jeans hanging over the chair and pulled them on, stumbling to the door and he was surprised when it opened and suspicious of course but he didn't have time to be rational right now. The door led out to a corridor, not a long corridor, a small one where he actually could see the end of it.

It was three rooms merged into one, kitchen, hall and living room. And on the couch someone sat, a book open in her lap and a curtain of blonde hair covering her face.

"Good, you're awake." The woman put the book down. She stood up, pulling her hair back behind her ears and smiled widely. "Long time no see, Allen."

"Juliet?"

--

"JUST WAKE THE FRIGGING UP!"

He sat up quickly, hitting his head on something and wincing in pain.

"Finally," someone said, sighing. "I was thinking you were dead."

He turned his head around, saw the bars surrounding him. The dirty, muddy ground soiled his clothes underneath. In the other cage he saw Ana-Lucia lean against the bars, waving at him.

"What the –" He felt tired, thirsty but most of all confused.

"– hell is going on? Damn, I wish I knew."

He stood up, seeing the trees indicating the jungle behind her cage. "You've seen –"

"Anybody else?" She shook her head. "Nah, no one. You've been out for a very long time. Gave me a lot of time."

"I'm glad you could be alone with your thoughts." He looked up, between the canopy of leaves rays of sunshine managed to flood in. "Do you have any idea where we are?"

He turned back to her – but she was gone. He blinked, the door to her cage was open and there was no sight of her.

"Ana?"

"_Subject escaped! Subject escaped!_"

"Sean!" He stumbled back as she ran over to his lock, banging a stone against it.

"How did you…"

"As I said," Ana grinned but was concentrated on the lock, "I had a lot of time when you were out… There. Come on!"

She grabbed his hand, because he was too stunned to act immediately. But soon he ran before her, leading her into the jungle. They darted through the trees, his head was swirling and he should just concentrate on running, but there were more questions he needed to ask her.

"How long? How far away are we?"

"Don't know," Ana answered, panting. "I woke up in the cage – I actually have no idea – Sean!"

Sean ducked, avoiding a dart flying next to his ear. He looked over his shoulder - a woman was chasing them, running with ease over the roots.

"Stop!" she screamed. "Or I will shoot you!"

Ana grabbed his hand again, pulled him down to the ground as another dart flew over their heads.

"Aren't you already doing that?" Ana shouted, getting up to her feet again, glaring at their follower.

BANG!

It wasn't the woman that was following them that fired. It wasn't a dart.

Ana looked surprised down at her stomach, like she couldn't believe that the red blood dripping down could be coming from her. She fell to her knees, writhing in pain.

Behind them, from the opposite side of their follower, a tall, black woman stepped out from the bushes. In her hand she held a gun.

Sean stood up, taking a step towards her but the she turned the gun to him. "One step closer and you'll end up like your friend," she growled.

Ana was moaning on the ground, clutching her stomach to stop the blood flow. The woman knelt down beside her, taking away her hands to inspect the wound. "This is bad. She will die."

"I know, Addie," the woman answered.

--

Flor wrapped the soft towel around her body and looked around for her clothes. One of the lockers was open, and inside hung a light blue dress with small red roses faint on the fabric; behind it hung a red scarf.

The dress fit her and she smoothed it out as she looked in the cracked mirror, it looked pretty on her she realized. But what haunted her were the red and blue marks on her arms leading up to her throat.

She touched them carefully and swallowed. Now she knew what the scarf was for.

They took her out of the building, and she was met by the familiar jungle again. At least she still was on the same island.

Ivan grabbed both of her wrists and put the handcuffs on and there was nothing she could do about it. Flor wriggled a little, didn't try much to get lose but it was enough for them to leave bruises on her arms. In a different blue shade than the sea they took her to.

The wind blew hard in her face when they dragged her towards the thatch-roofed table. The men suddenly let go of her, and she warily stepped towards the chair opposite the man sitting there.

"Sit down." He smiled as he ordered it.

She did as he said; looking at the breakfast lay out on the table before her.

"Want some tea?" he asked, holding up the teapot.

"We had a deal you know," Flor answered, holding his gaze steady. "Michael and I let you out." She blinked and looked away when she thought of what they've done to make that happen. "I-I'm not supposed to be here."

He sighed, laying down the pot on the table again. "I agree completely, Florence. I do. But unfortunately I am not… the only one in charge here. And the fact is that you failed your mission. You brought two people back that you weren't ordered to and killed Rosalie."

Flor's lip shivered and she looked up at him again. "So you punished me?"

"No, we punished both of you."

"But you let Michael go –"

He chuckled. "Michael has gotten his punishment just like you for killing her."

"Why is she so important to you? Why… why did you do any of this? Why did you make us…" She bit her lip, not wanting to say anything more.

"Because," Ben said, pouring himself some tea, "we were ordered to. Now, are you sure you don't want some tea Florence? You will need it."

"For what?" Her voice was weak, but that was how she felt. "You're gonna kill me aren't you?"

"Yes. Yes we are." He looked out at the sea. "But I did manage to get you some time before that."

Flor followed his gaze, but there was nothing out there but waves. "What?"

"One month. One month and then we will kill you. As you killed one of us."

It was like the wind stopped blowing, and that the waves stopped crashing against the rocks, silence. One month.

But that wasn't the worst thing. "She was one of you?" she asked, her voice trembling.

"She would've been," he said quietly. He inhaled slowly. "Now," he said, his voice sounding all the sudden almost cheerful, "let us enjoy this nice meal. And…" He searched her gaze and she met those scary eyes again, feeling trapped. "I believe I haven't introduced myself, my name is Benjamin Linus."

She asked more questions. She even screamed and felt the burning glare of the guards on her back. But she didn't get more answers. Sean, Allen and the rest were somewhere she didn't know. And she might not ever see them again.

One month.

Her mind was so occupied, that she didn't hear the small 'thank you' at the end of the meal, when the guards took her away and left Benjamin, sitting alone by the sea.

--

"J-Juliet?" he repeated again. It was her, that girl from a long time long ago. She was older now, and she spark in her eyes was gone, but her hair was still long and it was still _her._

And at the same time it wasn't.

Because this Juliet was speaking of fear, of him not needing to feel any, of greater things than the outer world, of their past, of the future. And it was a too big mess for him to handle. And he was not inquired to find out more about the whole destiny speech she threw at him.

"Let me out," he said, cutting her off.

Juliet blinked, but didn't look startled. Instead, she smiled at him like he was a little child. "Not even a hug?"

"I have no idea how you turned up here," he said, thinking about when she once told him she wanted to help people, but wasn't sure she dared to, "and I have no interest in founding it out. All I want is to go back to my daughter." In his head he added: 'and killing those who hurt her'.

Juliet walked around the couch, so she stood right in front of him. A strand of her hair was hanging in her face, and an old urge told him to put it away.

"You will be reunited with your daughter Al. Ellie right? It's a very sweet name. I think it suits her."

"You know nothing of my daughter," he growled.

"I know a lot. I know the day Ellie was born her mother died. I know that she looks so much like her. I know that her favorite movie is _Finding Nemo_. I know that she's been suffering from nightmares, most of them involving you dying."

"And her favorite ice cream?"

Juliet grinned. "Strawberry."

Allen stared at her, and soon the smile on her face faded. "Where are my friends?"

"Al…"

"Where are they?"

"You do not need to worry about them. It's you that is important."

The door on their side opened easily. And Allen gaped; he didn't know it'd been open. He frowned, feeling cheated of his chance to escape.

"Juliet," a black woman had opened the door, her eyes were round like a bug's, "and Allen, hello." She stepped into the room and closed the door behind her.

"My name is Beatrice," she introduced herself. "Juliet, have you explained his situation properly?"

Juliet looked at Allen. "Probably not. But it doesn't matter. I've told you before – he will never understand."

"You may leave," Beatrice said firmly, hidden anger in her tone.

Juliet kept her gaze on Allen, even when she opened the door. "I'll see you," she said.

--

It was very similar to her old prison, small, high walls and a bright lamp at the top, except here the lamp was buckled, broken and there was a security camera in one corner of the wall – untouched. There were nothing but a blanket, and on it, a person was lying.

Had been lying. The woman went up to her feet quickly as Flor was brutally thrown in. Her eyes narrowed and measured her from up and down, not caring to lend a hand to help Flor off the floor.

"Who are you?" Flor asked, sitting up. The woman's cold gaze was intense, lingering and she felt uncomfortable under its stare. "You – you weren't on the plane were you?"

The woman glanced at the door, and then to Flor, her eyes going to her neck. She bent forward and ruthlessly took the scarf from her.

It was such a strange act Flor found herself unable to do anything but gape and blink stupidly.

"I-I'm Florence. I got a death sentence. They're gonna kill me – you can trust me."

"Bluth?" Her voice was a lot smoother than Flor would've thought.

"You're one of them…" How else would she know her name?

Flor stood up, pressing her back against the wall, wishing she could disappear into it.

"I'm most certainly not. My name's Jóhanna, Janna. A prisoner like you. A death sentence is probably lying around somewhere for me." Her lips curled up a little at those words.

"So… so… you are from the plane?"

"As I said, I'm not." There was sound from outside the wall – steps. Janna straightened her back, her hands twitching after something that wasn't there. "When I shout for you to run – run."

Flor took a step forward. "What…"

Janna gripped the scarf tighter in her hand. And the lock was turned in the door and it opened slowly.

A man stood in the door, holding a tray with two bowls. He opened his mouth – and Janna kicked him straight in the stomach.

Flor yelled when another man barged into the room. He pointed his gun at her head. His finger on the trigger. Janna ducked, swinging her feet under him and making him keel over.

She twined the scarf around his neck and held tightly. His eyes almost went out of his head, he sputtered, tried to get a hold of her.

The other man swung out at her but she kicked him, still choking his companion to death on the floor.

"RUN!" she screamed at Flor. The man's face was getting redder and redder.

Flor leaped forward – to help her or to stop her she didn't know – when the man that'd gone in with the tray grabbed her arm, putting something – a taser-like device to her neck and she collapsed on the floor, writhing in pain.

Janna screamed at her. Screamed at her to stand up. Flor tried to, but she could only lift her head a little. Through a blur she saw more people rush into their prison, and then Janna was on the floor too.

She closed her eyes.

--

Jack was laying on the table when he heard the static. He sat up, looking around, his eyes finding the security camera.

But it was coming from elsewhere.

He stood up and moved over to the speaker on the wall.

"What?" he shouted into it, he heard fractions of words, the name 'Ana', and then…

"_I'm not going to operate on her…_"

"_She will die!_"

"_Let her die. She's not one of us. She wasn't on the list._"

"What are you doing?"

Jack swung around. Diane was just outside the transparent glass. She wore different clothes since he last saw her, a simple brown t-shirt and black pants. It had to be warm for her. But she didn't seem to mind.

"Who's talking?" He pointed at the speaker.

She looked at it uninterested. "That hasn't worked for years."

"They were talking – they said someone was going to die."

Finally, some reaction came from her. She flinched almost unseeingly, but he saw it. "Don't know what you're talking about."

"Is it Ana?" He pressed his hands against the glass. "Have you hurt her? I swear if you have –"

"Are you really in the position to be making threats? I do not think so. And the woman, Ana-Lucia? I said your friends were fine and I meant it. Now, I'm going to bring you some water and food, you need it. So sit down there." She nodded at the corner. "And I'll bring you it."

"I don't want your food!" he shouted after her as she walked away.

"Yeah, yeah," she replied in the same bored tone.

Suddenly an alarm began to ring. Diane's head looked up, turning around to him – like it was Jack who'd done something.

"What's that? What's that alarm?"

He saw a flicker of worry in her eyes. She didn't answer. She fled from the room, leaving the door open but unreachable for him.

--

Diane marched down the corridor, seeing people at the far end of it. But they were too far away for her to make out any details.

One of the figures walked towards her. The alarm shut off and she could hear what the man was trying to tell her:

"She's tried to escape again."

Diane sighed and looked past him. "Like always."

He grabbed her arm to stop her from going further. "Not like always," he growled. "Jamie's dead."

"Does Ivan know?" she asked, her voice earning a tiny bit of worry. "Never mind," she said before he could answer. Her lips pressing into a tight line as she walked past him towards the group already assembled outside the prison.

Through the open door she could see Florence lay, her arms spread over her head, reaching for something none of them could see, her dark hair covering her face.

"Luke, radio Lalah if you haven't done it." Her gaze still lingered on Florence's passed out form as she spoke. "Jim, turn off the alarm and you –" she turned to the two identical men " – relocate her."

"Ben hasn't given the orders –" one of them protested, looking at her with narrow eyes.

"Ben is occupied with Ford," she answered with her slightly bored tone. "Do as I say, relocate her. And find Ivan."

"Want us to tell us what happened to him? Diane, he's gonna crucify us for that. You're his sister you tell him!"

"I do not want him to know what happened. I want you to bring him to the operation room. Do not tell him what happened, you hear me?"

The twins shared a look, something Diane was very familiar with, something that only two people who'd been together for a long time could share – like siblings.

--

It felt too much like a horror scene that Dominoes described to him once.

Sawyer's hands were tied to chair behind him, making his back ache and hands hurt as his wrists were twisted in a painful way. In front of him was a small table, with a lonely chair on the opposite side. The room was empty but for those things.

When he tried to look over his shoulder – he caught a glimpse of a door too, so at least he had an escape route and wasn't held up in the freaking Cask of Amontillado.

"Hey!" he shouted, wetting his dry lips. "Where the hell am I? Care to answer me?"

He considered stomping his foot in the ground, but it was tied too close to the chair's legs. He assumed the floor wasn't any better than sitting up so he stayed put.

"HEY!" he shouted again, gritting his teeth as he tried to look around again.

"Be careful you don't strain yourself." The voice came from the door and Sawyer's gaze followed the man as he walked beside him to sit opposite of him. The man put a bag on the table and stared into Sawyer's eyes.

"You," Sawyer growled.

The man zipped the bag up. "I prefer to go by the name Ben."

"Why the hell… What the…"

"Are you at loss for words?" Ben smiled slightly, his voice mocking.

"Where the hell are the rest of 'em?"

"The rest of who?" Ben's smile faded away and he took out something rectangular from the bag.

"The –"

"– the people who came here with you, the rest of my people –"

"Shut up."

Ben just arched his eyebrows. And Sawyer realized it was a freaking laptop he'd put on the table. He got the sudden urge to smash the piece of technology to pieces.

"Where are we?"

"On an island. Where did you think we were?"

"How'd you get that?"

Ben turned the laptop around and pressed a button. "I bought it."

Sawyer turned his glaring gaze from him and looked at the screen. It was black and white, the quality sucked but he could make out a small room, with only a bed and a person sitting on it in it. First he thought it was Lori, but the girl's skin was far darker to be her. And she was little. She was swinging her legs and looking up at the roof with curiosity.

She looked into the camera and Ben pressed another button and the frame froze.

"Why are you showing me her?" he said quietly, the horror rising inside of him but he didn't dare to let it show. Didn't dare to believe what he'd just seen. "She's your prisoner? You get some kind of satisfaction from locking small kids up?"

"Don't you recognize her?" said Ben in a slow voice.

Sawyer glanced at the screen again. "Don't know what I'm supposed to be recognizing."

Ben chuckled darkly, shaking his head like he couldn't seriously believe what Sawyer was saying.

"What's so funny?"

"Just thought you would recognize Rosalie's daughter that's all."

"Eva… " He looked at the screen. Eva was now reading the book, flipping several pages and yawning. "You son of a bitch! Let her out! If you've hurt her I swear I will kill –"

"– me? I'm sorry James but I don't think you're in the position to be making threats, are you?" he paused, looking down. "We haven't hurt Eva. Not yet."

"Not yet? What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

Ben stood up and shut the laptop. "Take him."

Sawyer tried to turn around and saw a woman holding a gun pull a hood over his head. After that, all he saw was Eva's face before him behind closed eyes.

--

"Is she okay?" Sean screamed out to no one. He considered banging his fists against the bars. But that would only hurt and he doubted it would make any noise.

Ana-Lucia. She'd been hurt badly, the blood, the wound would be fatal. He knew it. He didn't doubt it.

But he hoped. And that he'd learned was important. Not that he liked to hope. He liked knowing.

"HEY! Is anyone listening?"

He rubbed his temple, sweating from the heat and from the screaming. With a tired sigh he sat down.

He looked up again when he heard footsteps, and saw two identical men dragging a limp Flor between them.

"Flor?" he shouted.

One of the twins looked at him. "You should stop screaming, you're upsetting the babies." He laughed but Sean just scowled at him.

To his relief he saw Flor stagger a little when they let go of her, but then she collapsed down on the ground. Her head leaned against the bars and he could see bruises on her arms and red marks on her wrists.

"What did you do to her?"

The twin laughed again. "Why do you care?"

"If you hurt her…" Sean knew they already had, and the words didn't make anything better.

"Like she hurt Rosalie?" the other twin said, shaking his head. "Be glad we haven't put a bullet through her head."

The two of then left, ignoring Sean's threats about slicing their throats and letting Lori go free with a knife on them when he managed to escape.

"Flor? Come on!" he shouted when they were gone.

Flor tilted her head slightly to the side, but that was the only recognition he got from her.

--

"Let's take a walk."

"You say it like I have a choice," Allen told her, clenching his fist.

Beatrice, Bea as she wanted to be called tilted her head, looking at him with curiosity.

"You always have a choice." She walked over to the door and opened it again. "Come with me."

"Where are we going?"

"We're going for a walk."

He grudgingly walked behind her out of the house. He blinked when he stepped out on the small porch. The sun blinded him at first but then he saw the jungle around him. He turned around; the house he'd been in was painted in the same color as the walls – yellow.

"You built this house?" he asked her.

"No. We didn't."

She took a few steps, and then looked over her shoulder when she saw him not following her.

"If you try to run I will stop you."

Allen believed her.

--

"Ivan we need you."

It was nice to be needed, he supposed. But all of them were. All of them were a part of the puzzle that kept them together. Kept them working. It was weird to think of oneself as a piece, but that was how Ben had described it to him.

But he was not happy about being a part of those who tried to save Ana-Lucia.

She wasn't even supposed to be there with them. She wasn't on the freaking list.

"I'm not a frigging surgeon," he grumbled, looking at the woman's pale face, she looked dead already.

That's why he didn't go to the pit and back to save her. In other words he barely tried.

"Time of death… Got a watch, sweetheart?"

Felicity glared at him. She threw down her gloves on the floor, looking childishly when she stormed out of them room. Diane came in through the doors, not looking a bit surprised at her outburst.

"Is she dead now?" she asked.

Ivan nodded shortly. Diane stood many feet away from him, but he could still feel her annoyance with him radiate through the air. That chick was creepy.

Diane strolled up beside the table where Ana-Lucia laid, her face as always expressionless but when you'd been around her for as long as Ivan had – you learned to take notice of the little things.

"Good. Take her to Hume."

"The blind girl? I thought she was back at the –"

"She's here. And she is not going anywhere. Do as I say."

She left the room and Ivan tried, like usual, to kill her with his mind. As usual, it didn't work. With a sigh he rolled the table out in the corridor, not bothering to be too careful with Ana-Lucia's body.

With a bit difficulty he opened the slow door, flakes of rust fell down on the floor as he did so, revealing a long corridor sloping down.

The bright light from above got turned into the ominous green color that he loved and hated at the same time. Loved because – honestly – it was kind of cool. Hated because it made him feel like he was in a bad horror movie.

He frowned as he reached the door, almost hidden in the dark. There was no guard outside, there was always supposed to be one. He had to radio Lalah about that later.

Inside the room to the door he'd just opened he saw a girl sit on the table. Her head snapped around when he came in, but she didn't make a move to attack him. Her eyes were turned to a direction beside him, unseeing.

"Who… who's there?" she said weakly, her right hand shivering as she raised it.

He chuckled. He couldn't help himself. She just looked so damn pathetic.

He rolled in the table with the body until it hit the edge of hers. She flinched. The blanket covering Ana-Lucia fell on the floor.

He closed the door behind him, leaving Lorraine alone with the corpse of her friend's.

--

When Sawyer woke up again, he was still in the damn Room of Doom, sitting in the same bloody chair with the same frigging table in front of him.

Only with less clothes on.

Curiously he fingered on the patch over his chest – over the spot where his heart probably was according to Rosalie.

He pushed the thought away and focused on the fact that he _wasn't tied up anymore. _

And the fact that he was shirtless.

He stood up so fast the chair knocked over, stumbling a few feet before he crashed on the floor, his legs too weak to bear him.

He just had to reach the door; if he could reach the door he would be free. He would be free to…

To do what? Escape? Kill as many sons of a bitches he could? Recue… Eva?

He didn't get time to do any of it. One of the doors – there was two, he hadn't noticed the other one before – opened and the Bug-Eyed bastard stepped in, looking down at him like he's some kind of child caught trying to get into the cookie jar.

"There's three guards outside," Ben said, not offering to help him up. "You can't escape."

"Three guards outside which door?" asked Sawyer, standing up on his feet, dizziness overtaking him.

"The right one," Ben answered.

"And behind the other?"

"Is Eva Mills-Burton."

Sawyer knew that there probably are more than three guards outside, watching him and just waiting to put a bullet in his head, but he didn't frigging care when he slammed Ben up against the wall.

"Don't. You. Dare."

"I am not lying. Put me down."

Sawyer shook his head slowly. "First I'll choke the life out of ya."

"Don't get too worked up, otherwise you're the one whose life is going away."

Sawyer was pulled away, a gun pressing into his neck and he didn't fight against it.

"You gonna kill me?"

Ben took a deep breath, straightening his shirt. "No we're not, James. Because you are going to kill yourself. Do you know what a pacemaker is?"

"What?" he spat, now trying to get loose from the two guards.

"They stick them in the tickers of people who've had by-pass work who's heart's need just a little jump – a kickstart…"

One of the guards grabbed his wrist and put on something that looked like a watch.

"Your active heart rate is 140 – yes we know," he said when he saw Sawyer's confused face. "Which is the point at which your pacemaker will cause your heart to explode. This is how I know that you're going to start… behaving now. The watch monitors your pulse. If you get within fifteen beats of your danger zone it'll start to beep. If and when it beeps, you're going to want to relax yourself. Unless you of course… _do_ want to die."

"What the – what makes you think –" The watch began to beep and Sawyer shut his mouth abruptly.

Ben walked over to the right door and the two guards let go of him. The woman still pointed her gun at him.

"If you open that door," he nodded at the other one on his side, "and speak – talk – try even to communicate – we'll put one inside Eva too."

--

"Where's Lori?"

"Sit over there. I will then give you the food."

Jack shook his head. "No, tell me where she is!"

"There's no need to scream."

He took a step back and looked at her with disgust. "Tell me where she is."

Diane blinked rapidly again, but she still looked calm. She sighed deeply. "Let's make a deal. You sit over there, I give you food, you eat and I will tell you how she is."

Jack turned around and slowly sat in the corner. Diane left the room only to come in through his door, glancing at the speaker as she did so.

Jack wasn't going to ask her about it. Because if he had the chance to listen in on them – he wasn't going to ruin it by being stubborn – or as Lori put it: 'Being Jackie'.

Diane now held a tray in her hands, carefully balancing a bowl with soup on it. She put it down on the table. Her back turned to him. Like she didn't expect that he would attack – do anything to harm her, to escape.

For one moment he considered it. Hitting her over the head, flee, run the fastest he could away.

She turned to him again and gestured at the bowl. "Eat."

"Tell me about –"

"I will." She walked out again and closed the door behind her.

Jack took up the spoon, tasting the soup on his tongue, it was cold – but it tasted fantastic compared to what he'd been eating on the island.

"She's fine."

Her voice startled him and he dropped the spoon in the bowl, spluttering soup over his clothes. She was behind the glass again.

"You've already told me that."

"She is being kept in a room. A room with a bed, drawer, bookcase. We give her clothes – food. She's fine. She is angry of course as you could expect from her. She wants us to let her go. But we have _not_ hurt her."

Jack laughed, but inside he felt rising suspicion and worry. "Why would you do that to her?"

Diane took a step closer and pressed her hand against the glass. She pulled her face into a grimace – no – a try for a smile, her lips curling up a little but unused to the expression.

"Because, Jack, we want her – as well as you – to become one of us."

--

"What is this?"

Bea didn't smile, but there was humor in her voice. "It's our home."

Allen looked around at the houses in awe. They were all similar, bright yellow like the one he'd been in. But he didn't imagine there were so many.

He saw a child run across the green grass, laughing as another chased him. He saw two old women sit in a hammock. A couple holding hands under a tree. It was almost idyllic.

"Am I still on the island?"

"Yes you are," Bea answered him.

"And my friends?" Allen snapped out of the admiring. This wasn't the real world. This was people who'd kidnapped him.

"They are on another island."

"On another what?"

--

"All this walking back and forth. Can't they just decide where to keep the girl?"

Flor blinked, looked up at one of the twins that now stood in her – her what? She was too numb to fight against as they pulled her up again and she realized far back in her mind that her prison was now a cage.

"Where are you taking her?"

Flor looked over her shoulder and saw Sean stand in another cage. He met her gaze briefly but then looked away.

"What are you going to do?" he shouted.

Flor just followed them. Limp. Dead. Weak. It didn't matter. She was just living a dream within a dream. Whatever they were about to do… didn't matter. She was dead anyway. One month.

She was so tired of this fight.

She shivered when they brought her inside again, but instead of going down into the darkness they took her up a flight of stairs, slippery from water.

"What happened?" she asked, waking up from her mindless state as they were all careful not to slip.

They didn't answer her and led her into another corridor.

It was so empty. Everywhere. Quiet.

They let her go suddenly.

"Go in there."

She looked at them with scared eyes and turned to the blue door. "What's in there…?"

"Just go," one of them spat.

She took a deep breath, braced herself for whatever was about to come and opened the door with ease. She stepped inside and immediately the door was closed behind her.

The room was flooded with light from two huge windows and Flor was blinded at first, she squinted and saw someone stand by one of them.

The woman standing there was wearing a simple, white dress. A dress that left her scarred arms bare, there for the world to see. The woman whirled around, a hint of panic flashed in her eyes but then a smile spread across her face.

"Flor!" She rushed forward and embraced her in a tight hug.

Flor winced and pulled away from her quickly. "Claret… what are you doing here?"

She looked around and saw to her surprise that the room was perfectly furnitured, if not almost too much. There hung paintings on the walls, a nice, big bed was in the corner and underneath one of the window was a table with a fruit basket. _A fruit basket._ It was like she'd arrived at a hotel.

"What happened?" Claret asked, gently lifting one of Flor's arms and looked at the bruises, her expression worried despite the fact that she herself had more horrid scars.

Flor took a step back and rubbed her wrist like Claret's touch burned her. "I was kidnapped. Unlike you."

"Flor…"

"Are you denying it?"

Claret looked down. "I was kidnapped. Very brutally. But it's all right now."

"All right? You know where they keep us? They… they like electrocuted me!"

"Compared to murder that's a small thing," Claret said in a serious voice. "Yeah... they told me."

Flor blinked several times and tried to breathe slowly. She couldn't cry more. She wouldn't.

She shook her head slowly. "What am I doing here? What are you doing here?"

Claret took her hands again, a gentle gesture towards someone who was considered a murderer.

"You are here because you only got one month left to live, Flor. And I am here to help you die."

--

**Author's Notes: **Introducing, many, many characters. The biggest introduction was of **Jóhanna Stefándóttir **submitted by Elyad. But there are many more, well, names mentioned.

Thank you guys so much for your awesome reviews… but even more awesome characters. They will be introduced as the story goes on… but as a warning to some of you – some characters won't show up in a long time. Just like the answers.

And also, the submissions for Others is still open! Feel free to send in as many as you want.

Next chapter we'll see what happened to some of those who got kidnapped a long time ago.

And remember, reviews makes me want to write and update faster!

Namaste.


	33. The Tragedy

_But see, amid the mimic rout  
A crawling shape intrude!  
A blood-red thing that writhes from out  
The scenic solitude!  
It writhes!- it writhes!- with mortal pangs  
The mimes become its food,  
And seraphs sob at vermin fangs  
In human gore imbued._

Out- out are the lights- out all!  
And, over each quivering form,  
The curtain, a funeral pall,  
Comes down with the rush of a storm,  
While the angels, all pallid and wan,  
Uprising, unveiling, affirm  
That the play is the tragedy, "Man,"  
And its hero the Conqueror Worm.

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 26, The Tragedy**

--

She looked over her shoulder, slowing her pace slightly before she turned around again. Her short blonde hair barely reached over her ears, as she pulled a strand away from her face. Over her left eyebrow was a red cut, almost shining in the dim light.

"I do not wish to worry you. But hurry," a voice said from behind her.

She looked up at the dirty, gray roof. "It feels like we're being followed."

"That's because we probably are. I'll wait here for you."

She nodded without looking at her companion, picking up her pace almost in a run until she almost reached the end of the corridor; there she opened the door to her left, not hesitating as she rushed into the room.

The girl sitting on the bed looked up, her eyes widening in surprise as she took her hand.

"Claire?" she whispered, holding her hand tighter. Her palm was sweaty, almost slipping out of her grip, shaking – probably from fear and stress over what'd happened over the past few days.

Claire smiled weakly. "Come on, Wendy," she said, helping the girl up to her feet. "We don't got much time."

--

**5 days earlier**

--

"Aaron…" she whispered softly. Sighing as she was on the brink of consciousness. There was no sound of the sea, no waves crashing onto the land. It was too quiet.

"Aaron!" she repeated with a yell. She opened her eyes and immediately tried to sit up, but her wrists and legs were held back by something.

"HELP ME!" she screamed, looking down on her body. She was dressed in the same hospital gown she had before – the first time they kidnapped her. Her wrists and legs were strapped to the bed she was lying in. She tried to wriggle free but she was stuck.

_Claret. Kaylee. Aaron. Owen._ The names went though her head and maybe she screamed them, maybe she didn't.

"Calm down! CALM down!" Someone released her from her bounds, grabbing her arms to stop her from punching him right in the face. "Claire, you need to calm down."

Claire was almost hyperventilating, breathing hard. A tear ran down her face. "Where am I? What have you done to me?"

Her head hurt like it never had before. And her mind wasn't fuzzy, it was clear and it frightened her that they hadn't put drugs inside of her.

He let go of her arms and she let them fall to her side. She blinked back the tears and saw a woman stand in the entrance to the room. While the man in front of her was smiling slightly and had a kind expression she looked cold and stern.

Somehow she was more afraid of the smiling man. Because someone who could be happy after kidnapping a person could never be good.

"I know you are frightened, very confused and most of all hateful towards us."

He got that right. She'd heard that speech before. She looked down at her legs, they were still tied down.

"I know you will not believe me when I say this…" the man continued, "but we will not harm you, Claire. My name is Garrett Speir." He looked over his shoulder at the woman standing there. "And her name is Madeline."

"Maddy," the girl said quickly. She was watching Claire and she felt slightly uncomfortable under her burning gaze.

"You already hurt me once," said Claire, putting her hands together. "When you kidnapped me the first time, remember? I remember you convinced Owen that she was special and –"

"How much do you remember of when you were with us?" The man's voice was patient even though he interrupted her.

"I remember enough."

Garrett smiled. "I don't think you do."

Claret put her hand up to brush her hair back behind her ears, when she felt that it was much lighter, shorter than before. "Did you cut my hair?"

Garrett gave a lighthearted laugh. "Yes, you see when you arrived there was much blood in your hair and we thought it would be much simpler –"

Claire punched him in the face, and now it was the girl Maddy who was laughing.

--

Claire kept throwing glances at the door. It was so near, her escape was in her reach. It didn't matter that Garrett and Maddy still were in the room, they couldn't stop her and all she had to do was to run and she would make it out the door in a second and –

The door swung open and a tall woman stepped inside the room. Her dark, intense eyes met Claire's.

"Good, you're finally here." Garrett and Maddy stood up from the couch simultaneously.

The woman nodded but didn't do anything else to acknowledge them as she sat down on the armchair opposite of Claire.

Garrett smiled at Claire as he left, bur Maddy just kept looking at her with her lingering gaze until she closed the door behind them.

"Hi, Claire. I'm Lalah." The woman smiled almost shyly at her. "I'm in the Security here on the island."

"You guys got security here?"

Lalah chuckled. "Yeah, as you see we got houses and running water too."

Claire bit her lip and looked down.

"Look, Claire, I know you must be kind of tired of hearing this all the time. But I know you're scared – freaked out, away from your son, 'kidnapped' once again. It's not easy. But it's gonna get better, yeah?"

"Why…" Claire inhaled deeply and looked up. "Why did you take me?"

Lalah shrugged. "It's the big boys far up in the skyscraper that decides that kind of stuff."

"Skyscraper?" Claire replied, sounding horrified.

"Scratch that. I think you've heard of destiny, yeah?"

"Yeah… " Of course Claire knew of destiny, knew of fate, knew of things that were written in the stars. She'd believed in it once, too. But on the day of the crash the only thing her horoscope had said was that she should look twice before crossing the road. "Does this destiny thing mean you'll let me return to my son? Because then I'll believe in it."

Lalah snorted. "Destiny isn't always great y'know. Just 'cause things are going your way doesn't mean someone's looking out for you. It doesn't mean there's some kind of fate or guardian angel at your side. It means you're lucky. Destiny though, is the final destination. You're supposed to be here, Claire Littleton and that's why we took you. That's why you will stay."

"I will stay because of destiny?" Claire said, her tone clearly disbelieving.

"You'll stay because in that way we won't take your son too. I hate to be cruel, but that's how it is. Look at it like when you were in school and got stars for every good thing you did? It's like that here. If you're nice, listen to us, don't cause any trouble we'll reward you with freedom – and in the end perhaps you'll get to see your son."

Claire swallowed, thinking of Aaron. She hoped Wendy would be able to take care of him just a while longer. "So what do you want me to do?"

"It's quite simple really," Lalah said and leaned forward. "We want you to lie."

--

**Present time**

--

They got her out of the room. But Wendy barely had the strength to stand up. They put her down on the floor and she leaned back against the wall, her eyes closed.

Claire stroked the hair out of Wendy's face, looking at her sadly. "What did they do to you?" she asked softly.

"They drugged her," the other woman said. "We must go."

"Who… who's she?" Wendy slowly opened her eyes again, and leaned onto Claire as she weakly stood up again. "You got shorter hair," she mumbled and touched Claire's face.

"Her name's Madeline. Maddy." Claire glanced at the tall, slim woman at her side. "She's been helping me. She's nice."

Maddy smiled, but she still looked worried. "Thank you. I know you must be tired. But we have to go. The distraction I made will not last wrong.

She took Wendy's other arm around her neck to help her. "Do you believe you can run?"

Wendy laughed quietly. "I can barely stand. Wait… Maddy… She's an Other right?"

"Yes," Claire answered warily.

"Then… then…" Wendy looked up at Maddy's face. It was heart shaped, full with faint freckles, but she was searching her gaze, trying to look her into the eye. "Where's Karl? Do you know where he is?"

Maddy looked down. "We have to get you out of here –"

Wendy stopped walking, trying to glare the best she could. "I'm not leaving without him!"

Claire and Maddy shared a look.

"Please…" Claire begged.

Maddy looked from Claire to Wendy, and their pleading eyes. "Will you bring him with you back to your camp?"

Wendy nodded weakly.

She sighed deeply. "Only if we hurry."

--

**4 days earlier**

--

"Why can't I see Claret?" Claire turned away from the mirror. She hated looking in it but she couldn't tear her eyes away. Her long hair was now short, curly, barely reaching over her ears.

She faced Maddy who'd just entered the bedroom, not bothering with a polite greeting. "I know you have her. I know you do. You did that whole not-looking-in-the-eye thing and that means you were lying when you said she wasn't here!"

The night before she'd been calm. They hadn't harmed her, if you looked away from the fact that they'd kidnapped her. She'd listened patiently to their speeches, well, except for Maddy who for some reason never agreed or nodded when the Others threw the destiny speech at her.

She guessed Maddy was different, and now there was only Maddy here. Not Garrett, not Lalah just her.

Maddy looked at Claire like she was crazy. "Calm down."

"I'll calm down when you let me go."

"No." Maddy laughed despite Claire's fury, playing around with the ring on her finger. "I don't think you understand… Of course you may see Claret."

Claire turned her head every way as they walked over the grass. It was like she was back in the real world.

The houses were idyllic, replicas but with their own tint of personality with flowers in the garden or a fence around the house. There were benches along the pathway and a volleyball net with players on each side.

"What is this place?" she asked in awe.

"Their home," Maddy answered, looking at her with a confused expression.

"Theirs? Who are they?"

"The people who brutally took you against your will!" Maddy stopped walking and scowled at her. "Do not let this illusion fool you. These people are the ones who take children from their mothers." She began to walk again, her lips pressed together in a thin line.

Claire hurried to keep up with her pace, casting worried glances at the smiling people in the community, some even waved. "I… I thought you were one of them."

Maddy also looked at the waving people. Disgust in her tone when she said, "I've never been one of them."

The house where Claret was in was almost hidden behind large trees; it was on the outskirt of the rest of the Barracks. But it didn't look any less suburban than the rest of the homes.

Claire looked over her shoulder at Maddy. "Is she alone?"

"She won't leave. So she isn't being watched nor is she kept under constant guard."

"I don't understand…"

Maddy sighed but smiled weakly. "Neither do I."

Claire walked up the steps until she was on the porch.

"Why are you helping me?" she asked, looking at the door.

"Because I want to. And because I think… someone would have wanted me to. If that makes sense."

Claire shook her head. "It doesn't," she said and turned the doorknob and stepped into the house.

It looked just like the house she was in. But it felt different, like there really was someone living there and not just being kept against their will. She considered taking off her shoes but decided against it. There was no point.

There was no one in the living room, but there was an open book lying on the dinner table. Claire turned it around and saw that it was _The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. _

Claire heard a floorboard creak and spun around, dropping the book on the floor.

"Claire?" Claret's eyes were wide.

"Hey, Claret." Claire smiled; she was so glad and thankful that Claret seemed to be unharmed. There were no bruises on her face like there were on Claire's and no deep red cuts. But on her arms there were faint traces of scars.

Claire took a step forward to hug her friend but Claret avoided her, glaring into her eyes.

"You are not supposed to be here," she said gravely.

Claire's face fell. "What?"

Claret's angry expression faltered too and she smiled nervously. "I'm sorry I –"

"I don't understand. Are you hurt?" Claire looked up at the roof. "Are they watching us?"

Claret gently took her arm and Claire looked at her again. "No," Claret answered. "We are not."

"Then why…" Claire stared at her face and the realization hit her. "You're with them now aren't you?"

Claret was silent. She sat down on one of the table's chairs and sighed. "I think I have been since we first crashed."

Claire tried hard not to cry, but desperation – frustration was welling up inside of her and she didn't know how long she could hold it in.

"Why?" she managed to choke out.

"Because I think… I know they are good."

Claire took a shivering breath. "Did you betray us?"

"No, oh no!" Claret stood up again. "I didn't betray you – or anyone else at all. The kidnapping – taking of us wasn't really supposed to be _that_ way. The guy who did it has been punished. Ben was pretty angry –"

"Ben?"

"He's…" Claret frowned, trying to find the right word, "…their leader."

"You're friends with their leader?" Claire spat.

"Claire, please try to understand –"

"No! No I won't… I can't do this… I can't go through all of this anymore… I just want to go home."

Suddenly the door swung open. Lalah came in, a gun in her hand and her face cold like ice.

She pointed the gun at Claire. "I don't think you understood the conversation we had yesterday, girl. Come with me and don't make any trouble, all right?"

Claire slowly walked over to her side and she brutally grabbed her arm, making her wince.

"You do somethin' like that again and next time I won't cover for you or for Maddy. See how funny things are when Ben chooses your punishment." Lalah turned her gaze to Claret. "Thank you for giving us a call 'bout her."

Claret looked down on the floor as the door slammed closed.

--

**Present time**

--

"You talk funny," Wendy said and poked the woman on the cheek. Wendy giggled; the face she now was making was also funny.

Somewhere back in her mind she wondered if she should tell them about the camera stuck in the tree, but the thought faded as her grasp of reality did too.

"Be quiet," Maddy hissed. She turned to Claire who was hunched on the ground, looking into the dark, trying to see between the trees. "Karl is probably located further into the jungle. We can get to him on our way to the sonar fence."

"Probably?" Wendy was desperately trying to keep her mind clear, but it was difficult, it was like slipping in and out of a dream.

Claire stood up and leaned against a tree, straining her eyes to see, mumbling something about a flashlight.

Maddy took a deep breath. "There is a tiny possibility that he is being held together with the other prisoners down in the jail."

Claire's head snapped around. "Other prisoners?"

--

**3 days earlier**

--

"Shhh."

Claire gasped and made muffled sounds as a hand was put over her mouth. She blinked and tried to see through the dark. Maddy's face came into view.

She took her hand away slowly, to see if Claire would scream.

"What… what are you doing here?" Claire whispered. "Lalah forbid you from seeing me –"

"That is why I came when it was dark," said Maddy in a low tone. "That way it is easier to cover the surveillance camera up and blame it on being a malfunction."

Claire curled her lips up almost in a smile. "Thank you, for letting me see her. But why did you do it?"

"So you would see what they are."

Claire frowned in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"Our leader, Ben, he is a mastermind at manipulating people. As you know, he managed to manipulate a scared woman, who just had been in a plane crash to work for him only hours after. He manipulated your friend, Owen into believing she was meant to be something big. He was so convincing, that even when Claret was tortured she did not reveal the whole truth. And now he is trying to make you one of the pawns in his game too. I can't let that happen."

"Are you saying… are you going to help me escape?"

"I'm going to try. But…" Maddy looked down, she was rubbing her finger. Claire crinkled her eyes. Hadn't there been a ring there before? "Something has happened."

Claire asked, looking up again. "What?"

"Another one of your friends have been taken," she said seriously.

It felt like her heart stopped. "Who?"

"The pregnant girl… Wendy. So Claire, I need you to make a decision. I can only save one of you. because once I let one of you escape I'm not going to be let near anyone else for a long time. So it can only be one."

"I can't decide –"

"I know," said Maddy solemnly. "I'm not expecting you to."

--

"Shhh," a voice whispered, the words meant to be comforting but sounded instead stressed.

Someone was holding her hand and she pierced her nails into the flesh, earning a muffled whine and her hand being released. She opened her eyes quickly, but the world was too blurry for her to see clearly, she tried to form words – but her lips felt numb and her throat too dry.

"Can you see me?" the voice whispered again. She recognized that voice. She tried to say his name, her lips forming it but it came out as a weak sound.

"Wendy, please look at me."

"Tryin' to…" she mumbled. She blinked and suddenly as his face came into her view and she regained control of her limbs.

Enough control to slam her fist in his face.

Karl swore. Looking away as a trickle of blood ran down from his nose.

"Where's Brian?" Wendy spat, trying to sit up.

"Calm down," Karl said between his clenched teeth. "Lay down."

"Don't think so."

"They're watching – you're supposed to be drugged – Wendy, please!"

He tried to hold her down. "Look, they want me to drug you and if I can't do it they're going to make someone else – lay down."

"If I can prevent date-rape I'm gonna do it!"

"You don't have to take the drugs. You're just going to pretend! There's a camera hidden in here. And it expects you to drink this."

Wendy bit her lip hard, considering smashing the glass out of his hands. But it was Karl. Sure, she just hit him and he was trying to _give her drugs._

But he also had sad puppy-eyes that made her want to forgive him right this instant.

He smiled as she seemingly had calmed down, as she hadn't hit him in the last minute. "Look, pretend to swallow these…" He held up two pills. "And then, you have to pretend that you're drugged, talk incoherently, say crazy things, act high."

"Why?" she asked, glaring at him.

"Because…" his smile faded slightly, "otherwise it's going to be a lot difficult to help you and your baby escape."

**--**

**Present Time**

**--**

Wendy tried to keep her head up, but she laid down back on the ground, it was slightly uncomfortable, but she didn't think of it as much as the thought of how tired she was… and… and Karl.

Maddy shook Wendy awake again. "We don't have time for this. I must get you away from here." She helped Wendy up on her feet again.

Claire hadn't taken a single step. "Maddy, you told me Kaylee wasn't kidnapped. Who else is here?"

"Brian…" Wendy mumbled, she groaned and rubbed her temple. "He was captured too, I think, uh."

"We're going back for them." Claire turned around to head back towards the… the… oh God, Wendy could barely keep her head straight. Corridor, they'd kept her in a corridor and outside… flowers… and houses.

"No!" Maddy shouted. "Claire, I helped you escape to rescue Wendy and… and for you to get back to your son."

Claire was still walking away from them. Wendy thought she should stop. She would tell her that if it wasn't for the fact that Maddy's rushed voice was interrupting her every try to speak.

"Here is a map. Take it." She closed Wendy's fist around it. "Karl is on the cross I made. I suggest you do not go there. If Claire and I do not return, go to the sonar fence and press in 1623… I need to go. Stay hidden. Here is a gun, only use it if there is no other way out and…" She hesitated, still holding her hand. "Don't trust Owen."

Somehow Wendy got the feeling that it wasn't what she meant to say.

"You talk very middle age-y," was the last thing Wendy said to her before she disappeared into the dark.

**--**

**3 days earlier**

**--**

There'd been doctors, faces she pretended she didn't remember, words she pretended she didn't hear.

Wendy had asked, trying to sound as childishly and innocent as she could, where Brian and Owen were.

Even thought she'd heard what Owen had been saying when they came into the Pearl, when they'd stuck the needle in her, she'd heard her; she knew she'd betrayed them. But she still asked.

They answered that they were safe.

Wendy really doubted that.

She thought it was night. Because they took her back inside the room, turned off the lights and told her to go to sleep.

She'd gotten some things clear to her during the day. The Others weren't scared natives living in the jungle 'cause they had nowhere else to go. They were powerful. They had weapons – hell, even doctors it looked like.

And the reason they wanted her was because they thought she was pregnant.

Margo was so gonna name the baby not only Wendy, but Aurora in middle name just like her too.

When she'd just slipped under the covers, felt the unusual softness in her back, the door opened silently and Karl sneaked in.

"Late night booty call?" she joked, her voice shivering despite the smile on her face. "Karl, what the heck is going on? But first, how are you alive?"

He walked over to her side and sat down on the bed. "You thought I was dead?"

"Yeah… well… You sounded like you were going to be… you know…" She cleared her throat awkwardly, thinking of when she'd helped him stay hidden in the jungle.

"Well, I broke up with the boss's daughter." He chuckled, but Wendy could see he looked sad. "That earned me some points. But that's not…"

Wendy saw that he clearly wanted to change the subject, and she would happily do so. The weird feeling in her gut – that wasn't because of some pregnancy – irritated her. "You said they wanted me because I was pregnant, why?"

"Women here haven't been able to give birth since a long time back. They always sort of die…"

"Sort of?"

"They die. That's why your friend, Claire, was taken. Because she had gotten pregnant off the island, there was a chance that she could get saved, and she did. What did you tell them today… when they asked you when you got pregnant?"

"I… I said it was off island."

"They're going to keep you until you give birth. And if you're lucky – they'll let you go. But they won't let go of your baby."

Wendy closed her hand into a fist. "I'm not really pregnant," she whispered.

"What?"

She looked at him, breathing hard, but not out of fear of an unborn child. "I said I wasn't pregnant. I liked, okay! I lied. And tomorrow… they're taking me to do an ultrasound or somethin', and there won't be anything showing since – I'm not pregnant. What do you do about that huh?"

Karl met her gaze, his mouth slightly open in surprise.

"Then we need to get you out of here."

--

**Present time**

--

"You do understand that by helping you to free him… that I have to leave my people forever."

Claire blinked and looked at her in surprise. "That's… that's the first time you said 'my' people."

Maddy blushed slightly. "I didn't say that. I… I will join you then?"

Claire smiled faintly, placing a comforting hand on Maddy's shoulder before she turned her gaze to the entrance of the Welcome Center; the sign that said so was hanging on the side. "Yes."

"Brilliant," Maddy said. Her tone cheerful but she was frowning.

"Maddy," Claire said as Maddy stood up. "Thank you. I can't believe you're doing this for me."

Maddy bit her lip. "Honestly – I'm not doing this… just for you."

She crossed the ground quickly, the whole area was abandoned – she hoped. For one second she thought she saw a face in one of the windows. But hopefully it had been one of the children that thought they had a nightmare.

She used to have nightmares when she first arrived to the island. She had been frightened, a little six-year old who had no idea why she has been taken from her home and forced to stay with a woman and a man she had never met before.

But those memories of the old world, the world beyond the island had faded. And now she couldn't recall anything from before. She just had a feeling that this wasn't where she was supposed to be.

"Kiyoshi," she breathed as she'd run down the stairs. A man was standing in front of the monitors, by his side laid a rifle. "They require your help at the house fire."

The man's fingers trailed over to the weapon and closed around it. "I just got strict orders from Ben not to go anywhere."

"Oh," Maddy said simply.

"And I just got orders to make sure that you –" He turned slowly around " – would be taken care of as soon as you came in."

He lashed out with the rifle at her but Maddy was faster. She leaped forward, avoided his blow and grabbed the rifle from his hand.

Kiyoshi gritted his teeth as she pointed the weapon at him. "I see your mother taught you well."

"She also taught me how to point and shoot." Maddy smiled as his face fell.

She slammed the rifle down on his head. He collapsed on the floor.

She looked down at his unconscious form and put down the rifle on the table. "And she's not my mother."

She whirled around as Claire rushed into the room. She was panting hard, and in the light Maddy could see how horrible she looked. Her dress was torn from when she'd jumped out the window, dirty from the jungle and her face was glistening with sweat.

"They're coming!" she yelled, her eyes turning to Kiyoshi on the floor. "What happened?" she yelled in the same high tone.

"What do you mean by 'they're coming'?"

"The Others – your people – whatever." Claire looked around. "Where are they?"

"Claire we need to go now."

Claire stepped up closer to her, her eyes blazing. "I'm not going without Brian…" She rested her gaze on the door to Maddy's right and ran to it.

"No, Claire!" Maddy shouted after her as she opened the door and disappeared out of sight.

--

**2 days earlier**

--

Karl gave her the pills and Wendy brought the glass of water to her mouth.

"You sure that they really can't see the truth from that camera angle?"

Karl chuckled. "Really sure."

Wendy smiled back. "Lousy security, we should shoplift something while we're at it."

"Okay." Karl helped her stand up (Wendy hated it, she was not an invalid but apparently that was what you did when you were being drugged) and he did remind her for the millionth time that morning – and she probably had only been awake for one minute – that she had to act drugged.

"It's really not that easy," she muttered before he opened the door and helped her out in the corridor.

"Oy!" The blonde woman she remembered escorting her from room to room yesterday – Colleen stood in the way for them. "Where do you think you're going?"

Karl glanced at Wendy who tried her best to look like she was amongst pretty rainbows and women with diamonds in their hair.

"I'm taking her on a walk. She isn't supposed to have the ultrasound until much later, right?"

"I don't think that's gonna happen –" Static came from the walkie-talkie on the chair next to Wendy's room. Colleen glared at them and put it to her ear. "Yeah, no. Keep her down there…" She walked away from them, still throwing angry looks their way.

"Awesome," Wendy whispered, "my mom was right. There is a god. Now let's get out of here."

**--**

**Present time**

--

Wendy woke up to hearing voices. First she thought she'd gone crazy, or that she just had a really, really bad hangover. But then she remembered what'd happened and quickly sat up.

She saw lights between the trees – voices speaking, shouting. She struggled up to her feet – her body still felt a bit slow from the drugs. Something fell out of her hand – a note – a map.

In her other hand she had a gun.

With one look over her shoulder at the searching Others she began to run through the jungle.

--

**2 days earlier**

--

"That was surprisingly easy."

She looked over her shoulder at the door that led down to her prison. It was half-hidden between long, green vines but the path that led away from it showed that it was well used.

"I've earned their trust." Karl's face suddenly became stern.

Wendy looked up at him. "What did they make you do? Ooh, flowers!"

Karl chuckled as Wendy laughed at the sight of the yellow flowers planted on either side of the little way. It wasn't those flowers that grew wild in the jungle, but planted seeds that had grown with care.

"Karl," Wendy whispered and gripped his arm tighter. Someone was walking towards them.

"Hey Karl. And hey Wendy." The man stopped in front of them, he smiled bright – genuine. Like he didn't know that the girl in front of him had been kidnapped by his people. "Lovely day for a stroll isn't it?"

Karl nodded. He smiled nervously. "Just getting her some fresh air."

"It's good for the baby." He turned to Wendy. "I'm Vincent – you can call me Vince if you want." He turned his gaze back to Karl. "Son, say do you know if Colleen's down there?"

They shared a glance. "Yeah, she's there."

"Good." If possible, Vincent's smile grew even wider. "See you around, yeah? Nice meeting you, Wendy."

Wendy leaned closer to him when Vincent left through the door. "Dude, is he on drugs too?"

"Vincent? He's just that nice."

"Creepy. Just like the cameras." Wendy nodded at the trees on their left side. "And the one over there," she said and looked at the lonely probably fake lamppost. "You got security cameras all over the island?"

"Not _everywhere._"

Wendy shook her head. "Who are you people? No Karl, really. Who are you? Why would you kidnap us, not just me but what about the children?"

Karl looked forward at the path. "We give them a better life. Better than yours."

"Who are you to decide what's better?" she said softly.

--

"Garrett," Maddy said as she rushed into the security station, accidentally knocking over a chair as she did so.

"Madeline," Garrett answered without turning around. His eyes were fixated on the monitors in front of him.

Maddy rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. She hesitated before she said, "You know I don't like to be called Madeline."

He still didn't look at her. "You know I don't like to be called Garrett."

"Everyone calls you Garrett."

Garrett looked over at her. "I phrased it wrong; you know I don't like it when you call me Garrett."

Maddy has had this argument a hundred of times and she knew they would always repeat to some extent the same words and same glares and he'd still fight back. But this time was different, Karl was counting on her.

"Why are you here?" he asked.

"There's a Dharma van set on fire that has crashed into Ben's house!" _Don't look at the clock,_ she thought to herself.

Garrett rose from his chair. "A van on fire?"

Maddy nodded without losing eye contact. "Yes."

"Madeline, that has to be the worst excuse I've ever heard. Believe me; I've lived for a long time."

"So you keep reminding me," Maddy muttered, looking over his head at the monitor above. She swallowed when she saw Karl and the prisoner, Wendy on the screen, promenading amongst the trees.

Garrett raised an eyebrow, something Maddy always had been jealous of. She had no idea how he could do it. "Why do you wish for me to leave? Is it because of those we have saved?"

_Don't look at the clock. Don't look at the clock._

Maddy scowled at him. "We have _not _saved them."

"We are giving them a better life. You have spent much time with Claire; sure you have seen how better off she is now?"

She sighed. "Yes," she lied. "But I do not see the point with keeping the others here too. Claire I understand, the rest I don't."

"There have been orders –"

"Orders that you never tell where they are from!"

_Don't look at the clock. Don't look at the clock. _

Garret opened his mouth to respond, when a loud crash was heard from outside.

Maddy whirled around and saw Jim storm through the doors.

"What happened?" Garrett asked.

Jim grabbed a rifle and handed over one to him. "Jóhanna's escaped again."

Garrett nodded as he understood. "Maddy!" he shouted, forgetting himself, "Keep an eye on the monitors and contact us if you see her."

"I will."

Garrett ran up the stairs but Jim hesitated on the first step and turned around.

"This could go horribly wrong," he said, but then he smiled. "Otherwise I wouldn't do this!"

Maddy managed to smile too as he left. She looked at the monitor where Wendy and Karl had just disappeared out of view.

Then she looked at the clock.

Just in time.

--

**Present time**

--

The sun was starting to come up. She was already sweating, dead thirsty from the drugs and from the running and she dearly wanted it to rain.

But at least she now could see where she was running. Even though she had no idea where she was.

She knelt down on the ground. The trees here were huge, but not thick and it wasn't the ideal hiding place. But screw that, she was tired from the run from scary natives that had their own freaking village on an unknown island so she was allowed to be hopeless.

The small idea in her head to run back to Otherville and find Claire, Brian _anyone _had failed the minute she got clear in the head again and realized she was alone in freaking nowhere.

Either she would get kidnapped by the Others – again or starve from thirst or drown in her tears of self-pity which would only make her thirstier and it was an evil circle of doom that all led to her… doom.

Maybe she wasn't really clean from the drugs just yet.

She unfolded the little note and stared at it. She wanted water. Mmm, and a hamburger. And some Kim fruit.

Right, focus on the map.

Maybe she could save _someone._

--

Claire's eyes had immediately found Brian's when she'd opened the door. She'd run forward, not caring that there were bars in her way as she reached out for him.

_Alive. Alive. Alive. _Those were the words that echoed in her head as he breathed her name in surprise before he also ran forward and took her hands through the bars.

Claire had barely noticed she was speaking as she held his hands tighter, "….you're okay. You're fine. You're okay…"

Brian had let out a deep breath and smiled. "Yeah… not really."

That was when she noticed that there was someone else in the prison.

"Claire!" Maddy shouted. "We have to run now! I can't get them out. I don't have the keys and I do not have the time to get the lock to open. We must run. They're coming!"

"She's right. Go!" Brian said, without even knowing what they were talking about.

But Claire just kept her gaze on the other person in the cell. She let go of Brian's hands and ignored both his and Maddy's pleads.

"So he really did save you?" she said in a low voice.

"That's still up for discussion." Boone smirked and put his hands around the bars. There was dried blood on his upper lip, a bruise over his eye like he'd been in a fight. But it _was_ Boone.

Claire slowly leaned in and he whispered, "You should run."

--

**2 days earlier**

--

Karl looked at the watch on his wrist. Right now Jóhanna would have 'escaped', Jim would have left with Garrett and Maddy had 'accidentally' shut off all the surveillance monitors. They would have, if everything had gone according to plan.

"Right… uhm…" Karl could see glimpses of the houses between the slender trees. Anyone could be coming their way at any second.

Wendy looked confused. "What?"

"I think…" How he hoped he was right, "I think we can run now."

"Uh-uh." Wendy arched her eyebrows and stopped walking, looking around to see if there was anyone there. "Karl, you seem to have forgotten the billions of security cameras pointed at us right now."

Karl watched the camera hidden in the tree. He swallowed. "I think they aren't working right now."

"You think?" Wendy yelled. She crossed her arms, glaring at him. "How well did you exactly plan this escape attempt?"

Karl took her hand and pretended he didn't notice the quick smile on her lips. "Not well enough. Come on!"

"Are you sure they won't follow us?" asked Wendy as they began to flee through the jungle. "That we can just run and get out of here seems a little too simple. Things never are that easy. That Colleen chick –"

"They're being distracted," Karl replied quickly. But he was thinking the exact same thoughts as her.

Things never were easy for him.

--

**Present time**

--

"I'm so tired of this!"

"I'm tired of hearing you complaining."

"Guarding that little weasel – there's absolutely no point!"

"It's our orders."

"I hope the punishment will be good. Or all of this will have been for nothing."

It was a small cabin. The walls were gray and rotting. There was not even a lock on the simple door. The man and the woman guarding outside were carrying one rifle each, which made their odds a whole lot better than Wendy's.

She looked down at the gun in her hand. She knew the basics, point and shoot. But it wasn't really that easy.

The guards continued to banter as she tried to make her decision. Were they really bad people? Did they deserve to die?

They'd kidnapped her. Kidnapped many more. But they hadn't killed her. Maybe they would've if she'd stayed.

She could never be sure.

She stood up and raised the gun, pointing at the woman who was leaning against the cabin's wall.

She fired.

The bullet missed her by an inch and the both of them were immediately up on her feet. Shooting wildly into the trees. Wendy took a step forward, fired again and this time the bullet went straight into the woman's leg.

"WHO'S THERE?" the man yelled. He whirled around and fired right into where Wendy was standing.

She ducked behind a tree, gasped at the sudden pain that went through her body. She suddenly felt eerily cold. She blinked away the tears that threatened her eyes and took a harder grip around the gun. She stumbled forward. She could hear him coming her way.

"RADIO LEE!" the man shouted at the woman lying on the ground.

Another shot rang out over her head and she swirled around to fire blindly. This had been a horrid decision. She blamed it on the bloody drugs.

She heard him scream, and there came no other shots her way. Carefully she moved forward and the cabin came into view again. The woman was lying there, whimpering and the man lay still on the ground.

She was too afraid of what she would discover if she looked at him any longer and hurried over to the woman instead. She kicked the radio out of her hand.

"Don't you dare," she threatened.

Noise came from the radio, a voice. "_Steph, Steph you there? Reyes has escaped! Damn it Steph answer!_"

Wendy grabbed the radio and held it over the woman.

"Answer it," she said in a low voice. "Say you're okay; don't say anything else or I'll finish you and your friend."

The woman nodded frantically and took the radio in her bloody hand. "H-hey," she said with a shivering voice.

"_Steph, are you all right?_"

Steph looked up at Wendy with scared eyes. "Yes, I'm all right."

"_Good. Reyes has escaped_ again. _She's probably gonna go after Karl. If you see her just shoot. We don't need her anymore. Is that clear?_"

"Yes. Yes." Steph shut off the radio and Wendy ruthlessly took it from her hands.

Wendy was considering trying to tie the both of them up when she heard whines coming from inside the cabin. Still with the gun and radio in her hands she opened the door and hurried into the room.

"Karl!" she gasped and put down the gun and radio on the ground to frantically try to get up the knots that held up his arms toward the ceiling.

"Hey," Karl mumbled in a slow voice. His lips were bloody and his breath rattled.

"I'm going to get you out of here." Wendy managed to get his left arm free and it fell down to his side. He made no move to help her as she struggled with the other one.

"T-there are two guards…"

"I shot them."

Karl smiled weakly. "Huh."

Wendy got his other arm free. Karl was swinging on the spot and she put one of his arms over her shoulder to try to keep him up.

"H-how?" Karl asked.

"Claire helped me escape, and one of you, her name was Maddy. Come on." Wendy helped Karl sit down on one of the boxes. She took up the gun again and decided to hide the radio behind a pile of broken glass and planks.

Once outside, she took the gun holster from the man. The woman was nowhere in sight, only a small trail of blood that Wendy sure as hell wasn't ready to follow. The two rifles she decided to leave, she couldn't carry them.

She put the gun in its holster and helped Karl up on his feet again. "Which way is the exit?"

Karl pointed into the trees and they set off in the new direction.

--

**2 days earlier**

**--**

"There's a sonar fence surrounding our entire community. Cross it without shutting it off and you're dead."

"You do know how to shut if off right?"

Karl grinned. "'Course I do."

Wendy couldn't help the frown on her face. Of course she wanted to escape, but she was scared of what would happen if they caught them. And then there was the deal about all the other people who'd been kidnapped.

"Do you swear Brian's safe?" she asked in a stern voice.

"I can't exactly swear…" Karl said without looking at her.

Wendy halted and Karl sighed. "I know that he's safer than you. If they find out you aren't pregnant they got no use for you. You'll be in deep trouble."

All her instincts told her to turn around and go back. But there was another instinct, the strongest of them all and that was survival.

They began to walk in the same fast pace as before. With every step her worry rose.

She heard a twig break and whirled around, almost getting dizzy.

"No one's there," Karl said, but he had a small frown on his face.

Wendy swallowed back the insult she wanted to throw at him. "I know," she said instead.

She turned around again and stopped dead in her tracks. A woman stood between two trees, a gun in her hand pointed at them. Her clothes were rugged and torn, her face dirty but around her eyes that were pale green and fixated on them.

"You are one of them," the woman said quickly, her gaze lingering on Karl. She turned her eyes to Wendy, measuring the hospital gown.

Karl inhaled sharply. He looked scared and that frightened Wendy more than the gun pointed at them.

"Who is she?" Wendy whimpered.

"What is the code?" the woman asked coldly.

"Her name's Jóhanna, she's one of them," Karl answered in a whisper.

"What is the code?" she almost shouted. "Tell me or I'll shoot!"

"The code to what?" Wendy squeaked. "I don't know any code!"

"He knows. Tell me! Or I'll shoot her." She turned the gun at Wendy's head.

Karl held his hands up. "Okay! Okay! Calm down. I got it here… right here in my pocket let me just –"

Wendy screamed as she fired the gun.

"Do you think I'm joking?" she snapped. "Give me the code now or next time I will fire the bullet in her head instead of the tree!"

"Okay! OKAY! It's one –"

Splinter from the tree fell off as a shot was fired against the woman. Wendy swung around, shocked but it wasn't for them.

Karl pulled her down on the ground as other shots were fired. It came from their left and Wendy saw two men emerging from the forest, rifles pointed at Jóhanna.

Jóhanna took cover behind a rock and fired one more time before she set off into the other direction.

Wendy heard a scream and saw her fall down to the ground, if she'd been hit or not was impossible to tell but she wasn't moving.

"Karl?" Wendy looked up and saw one of the men stare down at them. "What in heaven's name are you doing… the prisoner!"

Karl struggled up to his feet and the man swung the rifle at him. "Don't move! Jim!" he shouted. "After you have tied her up come here. They have tried to escape."

--

**Present time**

--

Claire didn't listen to her and Maddy didn't have another choice. She had to do this or otherwise she would never see the light of the sun again.

She left Claire who was catching up with her fellow plane crash friends and ran back into the station. On the monitors she could see that Vincent, Garret and others were on their way. She had no time to run out of there.

She looked at Kiyoshi on the ground. She wondered if a hit over the head could induce memory loss, she sure hoped so when she did it to herself.

She felt a trickle of blood run down her face. With a groan she slid down on the floor.

"Maddy?" she heard Garrett shout hysterically. He knelt down in front of her and cupped her face in his hands. "What happened?"

She hoped Claire would understand.

"Claire… she…"

Garrett turned around and motioned for them to go into the cells. She heard shouts and screams and she closed her eyes, trying not to cry.

"You are going to be okay." And with those words Garrett took her up in his arms and carried her out like she still was a little child.

--

**1 day earlier**

--

"I'm going to be okay," Maddy assured him. "They do suspect me of trying to free Wendy. But it was only Karl who got into trouble."

Jim held up a hand. "I know that look, right there, it says 'I wanna go on another stupid heroic quest and save him.' Which we absolutely cannot. We risked our necks trying to save the not-pregnant girl. We can't do anything like that again."

As Maddy continued to have that spark in her eye he sighed. "Promise me you won't try anything like that again, all right Maddy? Not until I return from the Hydra."

"You speak like you won't try to free those who are there too." Maddy titled her head to the side and arched her eyebrows. "And you don't have the same protection as I have."

"Garrett won't be able to save your ass all the time."

Maddy smiled and tried to look cheerful. "He's been able thus far."

She pulled him into a quick hug before he could protest.

"Aw," he said and pouted when she pulled away. "No kiss?"

Maddy looked long after the boat as it drove away from the island. She sighed and pulled the jacket tighter around her. The air was warm, the wind blowing hard, but her heart ached that her friend had to go and she had to stay.

She was the only one left now.

She turned around and saw Garrett stand at the end of the dock. She pulled away the hair that had blown in her face and he was then gone. It was just like him.

She walked back to the Barracks, tried to ignore the angry glares that were cast her way, the blaming faces. They all knew that it was she who had helped Karl and Wendy.

It was always her.

He was sitting bent over a book in their couch when she stepped into the house. Reading it intently like he hadn't just came home like her.

She took off her jacket and hung it up on the hook. He still didn't say anything. She took off her shoes and deliberately put them off the mat. She looked up; he was still focused on the book.

She marched over to where he was sitting and snatched the book out of his hands. "Just say what's on your mind, Garrett."

He didn't look up or tried to get the book back. He just sighed and said, "Ben wanted to punish you."

"Like always," Maddy spat and sat down on the opposite armchair.

"No," Garrett shook his head slowly. "He wanted to send you away." He finally looked up and she could see there were tears in her eyes.

She tried to keep her voice steady when she asked, "Send me where?"

"That doesn't matter."

"Well it matters to me!"

"Damn it, Maddy!" Garrett shouted and stood up. She flinched at the force in his words, swallowing hard. "Listen to me for once in your life! They are all tired of you. You cause nothing but trouble since the day you got here. They doubt you are here for a purpose!"

"That's because I'm not!" Maddy yelled and she stood up too. "I'm not here for a reason like the rest of them are! I'm not! I'm here because you took me from my home!"

"We took you because –"

"Because you and Liz were selfish!" Maddy threw down the book on the table. "You wanted a child so you stole the nearest one and –"

"That's not how it happened!"

"YES IT IS!" Tears were falling down her face and she angrily wiped them off. "That's why I don't belong here! That is why I never will!" She shook her head and sobbed. "And you ask me why I don't call you dad anymore…" She whispered, "That's because you never were. Not since I realized that I would die looking older than you while you and Liz would live on and on forever. Not since I realized that I was just something to pass the time."

"Madeline…"

Maddy rushed past him on the way to her room. She slammed the door behind her just like she still was a little child.

At the same time, deep down underground they realized that the girl they'd kidnapped wasn't pregnant. That taking her had been for nothing. They put drugs in her, drugs that if she'd been carrying a child could've harmed it badly. And they left her inside a white room. And they waited for her to go mad.

Maddy opened her window, taking a deep breath as the wind hit her face. And she began to plan Claire and Wendy's escape.

--

**Present time**

--

"Will she be all right?"

"It's just a bruise," Maddy and Juliet said at the exact same time.

Garrett smiled faintly. "How about Kiyoshi?"

"He received a nasty hit on the head, but he should be all right too. He's sleeping right now; he did say some interesting things though when he was awake."

Maddy tensed as Juliet looked directly at her.

"What things?" Garrett asked.

"Just incoherent ramblings about fish," Juliet said. Her gaze still lingered on Maddy. She turned to Garrett. "You can take her home now. It must have been a stressful day for you both."

"For you too."

"Nah," Juliet shook her head and smiled, "Bea helped me out so it was okay."

Garrett helped Maddy up from the hospital bed even though there was no need and followed her out from the infirmary.

Maddy turned to him. "Is… is Claire all right?"

"She's been put in another prison. And no I will not tell you where." He kept his gaze looking forward.

"Gar –"

"Do you think I don't know that it was you who helped Claire escape?"

Maddy froze and stared at him.

"I'm going to erase the security tapes. And since Karl's house is now free I suggest you pack your things and move there." He didn't look at her when he walked away.

Maddy let out a sob turned around to go to Jim's house. Then realized he was gone. Just like everyone else.

Just like Fox.

--

Claire spit at the man when he took her away. But he did nothing but to put handcuffs around her wrists and even those were lose.

The thought of Brian and Boone, Boone alive and well kept her occupied as two others escorted her from the house. They'd put her in there for the night, and she knew it was only temporary that she got a bed to sleep in.

She hoped Wendy had made it out.

"Where are you taking me?" she asked the man on her side. He didn't answer. They stopped and Claire saw Lalah stalk towards her with long, angry steps.

"I'm taking over here, boys. Go back and help clear up the mess after the fire." She grabbed Claire's arm hard.

"You know what your escape attempt has caused us?"

Claire shook her head nervously.

"A house burned down. You know who was in it? Your friend Claret."

Claret looked startled at her and Lalah continued, "She made it out fine y'know. I just didn't think you were the person to sacrifice one's well being for the other."

"Does that mean Wendy –"

"I haven't said anything about her, have I?"

Claire stopped in her tracks. Her eyes were wide and she stared into the distance. Lalah followed her gaze and who she was looking at.

"Move!"

"Allen!" Claire shouted, clawing at Lalah's hands to get out of her grip. "ALL –"

Lalah hit her over the head and Claire winced. "Shut it!"

Lalah brought her back to the Welcome Center. Down into the security station and once again she saw Brian and Boone again.

"Claire!" Brian shouted when he saw her.

"Hey," Claire whispered, thinking she was going into the same cell as them. But Lalah led her further down the corridor; there were many rows of cells, all empty but one.

Lalah opened the jail door and pushed her inside. Claire fell on her face, the cuffs still on her hands. She groaned, trying to stand up. Lalah's steps faded as she walked away.

Someone helped her up to a sitting position and Claire winced, her wrists hurting badly. She looked up and gasped.

"Hey, Claire," Lalita said and stroked the hair out of her face. "How is Rosalie?"

--

**Author's Notes: **Yikes. This chapter possibly killed me. I might be a ghost.

Submissions for Others is still open, got some inspiration for a character? Just send me one! As I said, some won't be introduced until MUCH later.

This chapter though, introduced and mentioned characters. **Madeline 'Maddy'** submitted by SimplyAnonymous101, **Lalah Star Lee **submitted by DiorNicole, **Jim Tyberu Al** submitted by Girafe13, **Vincent Amore** submitted by xTheDoctorsCompanion and finally **Garrett Speir **submitted by Elyad. And of course some mentioned characters.

And the return of some of the Lost Losties! What do you think?

And I'm wondering if there's like a day you want me to update one, as the updates are probably going to be once a week, any preference?

Thank you all for your reviews!

Namaste.


	34. The Traveler

_By each spot the most unholy-  
In each nook most melancholy-  
There the traveler meets aghast  
Sheeted Memories of the Past-  
Shrouded forms that start and sigh  
As they pass the wanderer by-  
White-robed forms of friends long given,  
In agony, to the Earth- and Heaven._

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 27, The Traveler**

--

She took a rattled breath. Her lips were wet, a metallic taste in her mouth that she couldn't get away. She opened her eyes against the bright light and squinted up against the tree branches high above her.

She swore and quickly rolled to the side as something fell down from the sky, avoiding it by an inch. With heavy pants she looked over her back. She took it up in her hands, inspecting the inscriptions in the wood. It was Eko's Jesus stick.

"Freaking mother of…" She gazed up again at the sky, remembering another bright light, a noise penetrating her ears, feeling like the world would collapse on itself.

She remembered Wendy, Brian getting kidnapped, the tape, the tape that she cruelly showed to Locke just so she could get some glee from seeing his hopes get crushed. Realizing that everything – that hatch was frigging real and forks, yup, flying forks existed.

"Owen."

Owen gasped, startled. She turned around, the stick in a hard grip in her hand, ready to fight.

The person knelt down in front of her, smiled and took the stick out of her hands. "Owen," Rosalie said again, "we need to talk."

--

"I bet my life that they've been kidnapped."

Kim sat on the sand, her legs crossed, hands folded in her lap and her eyes big, round and so sad that Andrea felt her anger fade at the sight of her.

She sighed, looking at the mountains in the distance. Jack and the group still hadn't showed up at the village.

"Maybe," she said carefully, "we should move further down the shore, put the fire there, perhaps the mountain is blocking their view."

"You really think so?"

Andrea was too restless to laugh, but she almost smiled at the childlike question. "Yes I do."

"Fox!" Kim stood up, suddenly a bright smile on her face. "We're gonna sail again! Come on!"

Fox nodded faintly. He was standing by one of the yurts, just staring at nothing. Andrea found it very weird. He wasn't even standing… normally. He stood with his back straight and his arms close to his body like he was in the military.

Kim had told her Fox had some issues, while squealing over the fact that he was cute when they'd just arrived at the survivor's camp.

She guessed those issues were really bad.

"So we're heading b-back?" Fox asked without looking at her when they were back on the Elizabeth.

"No, we're heading further down the shore. We are going light another fire. Hopefully they will see that one."

"No, we can't do that!"

Andrea turned to look at him. He was staring at her with dark eyes. He sounded almost furious. Even Kim looked shocked.

Andrea crossed her arms. "Why exactly can't we?"

Fox made an irritated sound that could've been a word. But it wasn't in any language she understood. Then he said, "B-because… Uhm… Kim's right, they've might have been kidnapped."

"So…" Andrea had to be sure she got it right, "we're heading further down the shore."

--

Owen stumbled out of the jungle, still in a somewhat shocked state. She touched her forehead mindlessly, her fingertips getting bloody. She decided that she had very fine reasons to be surprised since – well, it wasn't everyday you saw dead people walking around and disappearing in front of your eyes.

"Owen?" Bonnie shrieked, hurrying over to her side. She put a hand on her cheek; Owen winced a little from the touch. She was probably bruised there. "What happened?"

Owen grabbed her arms, not just to hold herself up on her feet. "Has anyone else come back?"

"Anyone else…?"

"From the hatch." Owen said the words slowly, so that the blonde could understand. "Has anyone else returned?"

"Only Locke… Wait, Owen! You're hurt!"

"Tell me something I don't know," Owen grumbled as she rushed away from her, trying to find Locke. Not taking much notice to the changes around the camp when someone moved right in front of her, making her almost knock the person over.

"Wait, Owen." Kaylee did have the same worried expression everyone else did, but she had a feeling it wasn't directed to her. "Kate, Dom… They aren't back yet."

"So?" Owen muttered.

"So where the hell are they?" she snapped.

"How could I know?" Owen spat right back.

"Because _you_ were at the hatch and the two of _them _disappeared into the jungle and a while later the whole sky goes purple and everything is shaking and – stop!" Owen had already begun to walk away from her. "Locke won't tell us anything, what happened? Did you see them? Did you see Dom?"

"Yeah I saw Dom." Owen saw Kaylee's face light up at her words, hopeful.

"Well, how was he? Why isn't he here –"

"'Cause he's too busy running around. Naked." Owen smirked as Kaylee muttered swearwords under her breath and left her alone. The funny thing was that Owen hadn't been lying. "Hey!" Owen shouted after her. "Have any idea where Locke is?"

"Right here." Owen turned around so fast it was dizzying. Locke was looking at her with a stern face, and considering what'd happened she kind of got that they never would be best buddies.

"Hey," Owen breathed, preparing herself for what she was about to say. "I know there is the whole hatch – deal – thing going on _but_," Locke raised an eyebrow, "first there's something else we have to do."

"And what exactly is that?"

Owen said the next words very quickly, feeling like the stupidest person on the planet, "You have to help me speak to the island."

----

"I want to die," Owen grumbled into the pillow. She raised her cheek a little and said with more strength, "No, I want _you_ to die."

"Aww, is that how young people these days say good morning to their friends?"

"My friends I threaten to strangle. You Sven I want to murder."

Sven grabbed the pillow from her and she groaned, "I will stab you in your sleep."

"Here's a glass of water." He nudged her to drink from it and Owen did, then she spit it out.

"And I will throw your body in the river," she continued groggily, keeping her eyes closed.

"Then someone will find it."

"Yeah, I know. But no one will drive a case since no one will bloody miss you." She finally took the glass from him and drank a little. "There," she said and put the glass back in his hand, "an accomplished murder."

Sven grinned and leaned in, "Hilarious. Except now I know your plan."

Owen sat up and saw that it was raining outside; at least one thing fit her mood. "I'll get you drunk and you'll forget it."

Sven frowned and went away with the glass. He shouted, "I'm not so sure that drinking is good when you already have a hangover."

"I deserved it after that concert." Owen took on a shirt off the floor, realized halfway that she'd taken it on backwards.

There was never any awkward next morning stuff with them. Mostly because they both knew it was nothing more than sex and that Owen could very well stab him in his sleep. Sven obviously had some kind of death wish and she was fine with it.

"You're glowing," Sven said when she came into the kitchen.

Owen glared at him. "It's the hangover."

----

Hurley, Libby, Margo and Zidler were currently engaged in a 'Who's the Cuter Couple' contest on the beach.

Zidler had just given Margo a mix tape and Hurley was declaring his undying love for Libby through a badly written poem, Charlie meanwhile was making gagging noises behind them.

"I mean," Charlie said to Aaron, "Hurley I can understand. He has an excuse! He was in a mental hospital, he said so himself."

Aaron was playing around with his hair, but Charlie knew the little guy was listening intently.

"When you grow older, you should be careful you don't come out like Zidler. Don't worry. I'll help you the best I can. I mean, when you get a girl you expect her to be the girl in the relationship, right? But not Zidler. Soon he'll grow a uterus or something."

Aaron nodded which Charlie took as an agreement to his wise words. Then he yawned and Charlie decided to put little Turnip Head to bed.

As he gently pulled the little blanket over him he thought about Claire. Aaron was an ever reminding memory of her. He was afraid, afraid that Claire had been badly hurt by the Others. But mostly afraid that the Others would decided that having her wasn't enough and would go after Aaron too.

"Charlie! Charlie!" Ellie skipped over to the cradle, cooed a little over Aaron before she turned to him again. "Frogurt said I am a liar!"

Charlie raised his eyebrows, leaning back in the passenger seat. "Did you tell him you saw the unicorn? Because Ellie, I know your daddy didn't want us to tell you this but unicorns don't exist."

Ellie pouted, glaring at him, something she must've learned from Ana-Lucia. "I know I saw a unicorn!"

Charlie snorted. "Sure you did."

"But he said I was lying about the helicopter!"

"What helicopter?"

Ellie clapped her hands together and jumped. "I saw it yesterday in the bright light! It was a helicopter, Charlie! I _know_ it was."

Charlie sighed and rubbed his temple. "Ellie, you said the same thing about the talking polar bear, and about Michael being the devil, and about that the monster really is a big pile of black smoke."

Ellie looked at him with round, curious eyes. "Yes…?"

"Why don't you go and share your theories with Bonnie instead?"

"I can't." Ellie looked down sadly. "She's busy building traps with Bernard. And Owen won't listen to me; she said she was doing drugs with Locke. Charlie, what is drugs? Is it like food?"

--

"Andrea, look at that!" Kim shouted, pointing at the dock stretching out in the ocean. "Who would build that?"

Andrea had an idea; she took the binoculars from her. It looked like it was abandoned for the moment at least. "Let's anchor there."

Kim nodded and happily flashed a smile her way. Sweet, little Kimmy. Andrea felt a lump in her throat when she thought of what she was going to do. And Kim was so clueless about it, trusting Andrea endlessly.

Fox though, stared at her. His eyes dark and his gaze sent a shiver down her spine. She didn't like that look. He knew something was going on.

"I know what you're about to do," Fox hissed, his voice sharp and without stutter, holding Andrea's arm to stop her from climbing out the boat. Kim was skipping down the dock, unaware that they'd stayed behind.

"You do, huh?" Andrea raised her eyebrows, smiling but she felt everything but happy. "What exactly am I about to do?"

Fox didn't answer her; he just gave her one last glare and stepped out on the dock to follow after Kim.

--

"So," Locke said later, when they were seated far away from the camp by the church, "you saw Rosalie."

He'd been repeating those exact words all the time and Owen was getting quite tired of it. "Yup."

"Rosalie's dead."

"I know."

"Usually dead people don't speak."

Owen held up a finger. "Usually."

Locke sighed and continued to mix whatever weirdo gunk it was in the bowl.

"I've told you what happened to me when I woke up. What happened to you?" Owen asked.

Locke sighed lightly. "Woke up by the hatch, the remains of it."

"So it exploded?"

Locke shook his head. "Imploded."

"Then… how the hell did all the stuff get scattered over the jungle? How did we survive?"

"You were the one who had a nice chat with the dead, Owen. Why don't you tell me?"

Owen smiled a little. "You jealous? I thought you were the one who was in touch with island's mystical… philosophical… crap. And what is that?" Owen crinkled her nose.

"It's for you."

"Hold on. Am I supposed to eat that?" Damn Locke for looking so smug.

"Yes." The bastard only looked smugger.

"Okay, _slow down._ I'm all for… getting high and stuff but…" Owen observed the mix that now began to look more and more like pudding.

Locke held out the bowl to her. "You said you wanted to speak to the island. And this is the way."

"Fine." Owen grabbed the bowl from him and stepped into the tent.

----

Owen was so not going to stab him in the back. She was going to slice him into small little pieces, burn the bones, mix the burned bones and the little pieces and then stomp on it and then she would throw it all in the river.

She sighed and buried her face in her hands, taking a long and deep breath. _Everything's gonna be okay, _she told herself. _Everything's gonna be okay._

Except it was not. Owen Chauncey, the female David Bowie, the star, the legend was _frigging bloody pregnant._

Pregnant.

That word barely existed in her vocabulary range.

She stood up, her eyes widening in horror as she remembered the drink she had earlier. You weren't supposed to drink anything with alcohol weren't you?

Slowly she sat down again, told herself that it didn't matter. She wasn't keeping it anyway.

It didn't matter.

----

Charlie warily looked from the tent to Locke. "So, you're saying that you're not doing 'real' drugs?"

"No, I was saying that Owen was going to speak to the island."

"Locke," Charlie said slowly, "when the hatch exploded or imploded or whatever, is it possible that some parts of your brains imploded too?"

Inside the tent Owen was sweating. The heat from the fire was too close to her face. She took a deep breath, immediately feeling dizzy from the fumes. Nothing was happening.

"Hello again, Owen." Owen slowly looked to her side and without surprise she saw Rosalie sit, cross-legged next to her. She looked exactly like she'd done back in the jungle. And that teasing, un-Rosalie smile was still on her face.

"You said I had work to do," Owen whispered. The heat from the flames was gone, and all she felt was coldness in her heart.

Rosalie leaned closer and whispered, "And you do." She turned her gaze to the fire, the flames reflecting in her eyes. "There's someone you have to save."

Rosalie put her hand on her shoulder, Owen blinked and suddenly she wasn't in the tent anymore. Rosalie removed her hand, therefore releasing Owen from the only thing that felt real around her.

"What is this place?" Owen asked, trying to find sense in the shadows moving around her. The colorless world before her was nothing like the one she'd left.

"It's a plane." With those words everything slowed down but it was still surreal. People's movements – the air it was like she was underwater. But now she could see that they were at the entrance. A flight stewardess stood there, smiling and looking at the tickets with a glance before she gave them back.

Owen hastily took Rosalie's hand, an anchor to her in all the madness.

Rosalie told her, still whispering, "There's someone here that you have to save."

Rosalie unfolded her hand and in there was a crumpled ticket. The flight attendant wasn't smiling anymore as she took it. Her serious features, the blonde hair falling in her face – it reminded her of someone.

"Bonnie," she breathed. But Bonnie made no acknowledge that she'd heard or seen her. In this dream, Owen was invisible. "It's her. I have to save her."

Rosalie waited patiently for the ticket to be returned. Owen looked over her shoulder, there was no one waiting behind them. "Bonnie never needs saving," Rosalie said in her ear.

Owen shivered, turned around again.

And the air around her tightened. Sucked out from around her but no one but her seemed to notice when she saw that the door to the cockpit opened, and out stepped a smiling man, the pilot.

It was Zidler.

She could hear Zidler and Bonnie speak, but their words got lost, slow laughter from an illusion. And then Zidler waved. She swung around and saw that the one who'd been in line before them still was there. Margo had one hand on her much bigger belly and she was waving back, a shy smile on her face.

Someone walked up to her, took Margo's hand and they walked together away to find their seat. As he turned his head to the side to laugh at Margo, Owen saw that it was Dom.

"Is it them I'm supposed to help? Is it the baby?" Owen asked frantically, looking up at Rosalie who was clear, not fading, her voice not blurry but still _dead._

"You can't help them," Rosalie said. The smile fading as she said sadly, "Because one of them is already lost, one is going to be and the other we can never control."

They got their ticket back and Bonnie said to them, or to something slightly at the side of them – her eyes never quite meeting theirs – that they had to move.

Rosalie pulled her aside and they watched as three other passangers managed to get into the plane. It was Kaylee and Kate, their hands cuffed, loosely covered by two jackets. Kate looked scared, while Kay's face was unreadable. The woman in front of them had a badge that she showed up, introducing herself as Jóhanna, 'Janna', Stefándóttir.

She urged Kate and Kaylee forward, not throwing a glance their way as they disappeared out of view.

"Who is she?"

"She's dangerous. But she's no danger to you."

Bonnie began to close the doors when Owen heard, not blurry like she was underwater but clear that someone was shouting for her to stop.

In came running a very distraught guy, his glasses askew and he flashed an embarrassed smile their way. "Thank you so, so much for holding the doors! My friend is on the plane – I've lost her – thank you so much!" he said before rushing away from them.

"Never seen the guy," Owen said, staring after him, "is he important? Am I like, supposed to help him?"

"He is important," Rosalie said patiently. "When you see him again, you will help him."

"Why?"

Rosalie took a long moment before she said, "Because he is going to save someone."

"Who?"

"The person who killed me," she said simply and led her into the first section of the plane.

The small noises faded away as they walked further. The silence crawled over her and she closed her eyes for one second, taking a deep breath to break it. When she opened her eyes she saw that in the lines of empty rows, one man sat. His back to her. But she already knew who it was.

"Why is he alone?" Owen asked and couldn't help the shiver in her voice.

The man turns his head around and looked directly at her, _seeing her._ "Some people are just meant to be," Fox snarled.

Rosalie saw her hesitation and nudged her to go forward. Owen kept her gaze on Fox the entire time. When she couldn't see him anywhere she turned to Rosalie again.

"I want to help him. I can't believe I'm saying it but… that look in his eye… it's…"

"The most unbelievable pain you've ever seen," Rosalie finished the sentence for her.

Sounds filled the air again, but still out of reach. There were many empty seats, and Owen knew it didn't matter. What mattered was the people that were there, not the ones who were gone.

Owen walked in a daze right up to the pair sitting by one of the windows. Sean was 'reading' a book in his lap, glancing out the window from time to time and sometimes smiling at Kim on his side who was chattering away happily, clapping her hands together and Owen knew without hearing that Kim was rambling madness but that he didn't care.

"They don't look like they need help," Owen said. Even though she was right next to them it seemed like no one of them had heard her.

"Not right now. But soon they're going to be far worse off than those in the row before them."

Owen looked at the two sitting in front of them. Jack was by the window, but he was paying no attention to the blur of clouds outside. He kept throwing angry glares at Kim, her happiness disturbing him greatly. He also glanced at the woman next to him, Lori.

She was sitting hunched, her hair in front of her face and her skin pale and her body looking so small. Owen took a step toward her – and her head snapped up. Owen didn't know if she screamed or not. All she could suddenly focus on was the dark depths that were in Lori's face instead of her eyes.

"Why's she like that?"

They walked further down the aisle and Rosalie whispered, "Too many tears."

The plane suddenly seemed brighter, lighter, not so colorless anymore.

Owen saw Margo again… and Dom. Margo was giggling, holding a wrinkled note in her hand. Dom was trying to take it, laughing too but Margo held it out of his reach, her eyes glittering with happiness. None of them noticed the woman, Janna escorting Kate and Kaylee to their seats by the window. None of them noticed the pleading look Kate gave Dom. None of them noticed when Owen asked Rosalie:

"Who am I gonna save?"

"Kate needs help. I'll show you later how, but she's not the important now."

"Then who –"

"Down there." Rosalie nodded at something and Owen followed her gaze. As soon as she got her hand free from Rosalie's grip she ran, the world losing its colors, its sounds as she did so.

Owen was stopped from running further into the plane by glass. She pressed her hands against the glass wall and peered into the cabin on the other side.

She saw Flor and Sawyer sit together in the middle row, a tall, young, girl between them. The girl seemed to be totally still, while Owen could see Flor and Sawyer threaten each other with words she couldn't hear.

In the middle of the aisle on the other side Claire was screaming, shouting and hitting Boone on the arm. Boone was shouting back, red in the face as he then turned to Brian, who was standing a little on the outside, his arms wrapped around Aaron. Claire began to cry and Boone pulled her into a hug.

She had to get in. She knew she had to. She began to bang her hands against the glass. But no one inside heard her.

"You have to go there." Rosalie's panicked voice came from behind. "You have to go there and stop it. Owen, you have to! Go there and stop it!"

Owen was trying to. But the glass wouldn't budge. Desperately she continued to kick and hit, her hands aching, but how could they? When she was only in a dream.

Owen heard something creak and out of the corner of her eye she saw a door opened on the other side of the middle rows. She rushed over there, breathing hard, frantic.

Someone took her arm, and it felt real. Owen turned her gaze to the girl, Wendy. She was wearing a hospital gown; there was blood on her hands.

"_Please,_" Wendy whispered, sounding so, so small and so afraid.

"Please what?"

But Wendy didn't answer and Owen walked past her. Everything was darker in there. The silence more haunting than back with Fox. She glanced at her side. Flor, Sawyer and the girl were now sitting quietly. Just like Claire, Brian and Boone. But there were many more passengers there, they were standing up. Their backs straight and their eyes dead, guarding something she couldn't even dream of knowing.

She recognized some of them, and realized it was from her time with the Others.

She turned her gaze forward, and froze when she saw a young boy in the middle of her way.

Walt looked up at her with big eyes. "Hey."

"Hey," Owen breathed. Her voice suddenly caring. "Where's your dad?"

Walt was silent for a moment, then he looked down and said quietly, "He's not here anymore."

Owen screamed when he was thrown to the side. The plane lurching, shaking. The nightmare of the crash replaying itself.

No. No_. No._

She felt someone grab her hand again. Rosalie led her down, past the screaming persons to the end of the plane.

There was only the hatch door. Quarantine spelled out on it like some cruel joke.

Rosalie let go of her hand and began to fight at its edges, trying to tear it open. Owen suddenly realized what would happen if she got it open.

"You can't – you're not Wolverine – you can't – wait!"

"Owen." Rosalie tilted her head to the side, almost smiling. "Destiny doesn't wait."

She pulled the hatch door open and Owen closed her eyes. But she wasn't pulled away by the wind. Shocked she opened them again, staring at Rosalie with an open mouth. She walked over to her, just by the edge, down there she could see the clouds, she could even feel the wind.

All the questions she had would never be answered. So she asked the one that counted.

"Who is it that I have to save?"

"The mother," Rosalie replied sweetly.

There were many mothers in the world, could Rosalie be more cryptic? "Who?"

"Jump and find out."

Owen looked down; the wind was pulling at her now, drawing her to something, something she couldn't explain, something that shouldn't be explained.

"Destiny," she whispered. "Never really believed in that crap until now."

And she jumped.

--

"Owen? Owen are you all right?" Charlie grabbed her arms, Owen was shaking, her eyes big and panicked and she was mumbling too fast for him to understand what she was saying. "Owen! Owen, calm down!"

Owen released herself from his grip and wiped away the tears on her face.

"What happened?" Locke moved closer, staring at her in awe. "What did you see?"

Owen took a deep shivering breath. "I… I…"

"What was it?"

Owen struggled up on her feet, brushing away sweat from her brow, she turned to Locke. "We gotta save Kate."

--

"Here's some more firewood." Kim grinned and dropped it on the big bonfire they were building.

"Great." Andrea smiled. "There's some more over there, could you get it?"

Kim nodded and walked away from them, humming a tune that Andrea had never heard.

"You're g-gonna try to get the Others here," Fox said as soon as Kim was out of earshot.

"Yes," Andrea answered simply.

"What good will t-that do?"

"What good? Fox, you and I both know that our friends have been kidnapped. So when the Others see the fire, they'll be coming. And this time it will be them to walk into a trap."

Fox glanced at Kim. "Why not j-just say it? Tell us."

"Because you would want to stop me," she said in disgust, "for some reason I don't understand."

"You're right about t-that." Fox stalked towards Kim quickly and Andrea saw the smile on her face just as quickly fade away. Then, Kim looked at Andrea.

She nodded.

--

Someone put a foot on the case. "What do you think you're doing?" Bonnie asked, her tone friendly but her foot preventing Owen from opening it.

"I'm getting a gun," Owen said in a tone that clearly showed that she thought Bonnie had the brain of a two-year old.

"For what?"

"Does it matter? It's a free island."

Bonnie snatched the case away from her. "Not anymore it isn't. With the Others watching our every step we gotta be careful."

"It's not like I'll shoot anybody."

Bonnie grinned. "Then why do you need a gun?"

Owen huffed, trying to find an answer. "Who the hell appointed you our leader?" she snapped in the end.

Bonnie sighed lightly. "Okay, Owen. You'll get a gun – don't!" she barked when Owen tried to steal the case from her. "Those who practice shooting get guns, those who are on guard get guns and those who go on missions. So tell me, what mission is it?"

"I'm gonna look for Kate. You know, the hatch explosion…" Owen frowned. "Implosion?"

"Well you're not going alone."

"Can I get a gun if I take someone with me?"

Bonnie arched an eyebrow. "That depends on who it is."

"Yo!" Owen shouted minutes later to Charlie and Locke. "Wanna go with me on another one of those crazy suicide missions?"

--

"ZIDLER!" Margo yelled, running quickly to his side, removing the plank and checking if there were any injuries. "Oh God, are you okay? Can you see me? Are you dead? How many fingers am I holding up?"

"Four," Zidler answered hoarsely.

"No it's five… uh, four. Yes. You were right." Margo flushed with embarrassment.

"When you two are done rounding second base, could you stop ruining for us and get the hell away from here?" Neil, or Frogurt as Zidler now decided to know call him, shouted.

"It's okay," Margo said gently after she'd put a band-aid over his brow, now far away from the tree fort they'd been building.

Zidler mumbled under his breath about how Frogurt was an 'idiot' and how he would love to lock him inside a room together with his sister Hazel one day and see how sane he was when he got out.

Margo giggled and Zidler was about to lean in for a kiss, because, well, he guessed he could do that now, right? But a voice broke up his thoughts.

"Margo – Zidler! I'm sorry to interrupt –" Kaylee didn't look sorry to interrupt at all "– but have you guys seen Dom and Kate? They aren't back yet."

"He's not back yet?" Margo said in a high-pitched tone, she blushed and cleared her throat. "I mean, they're not… uh. But I just saw Owen and Locke."

"I know. They haven't seen them either and no one else seems worried…" Kay made an upset sigh. "It's not like I can go back into the jungle again and search."

Margo stood up fast. "I'll go."

"Whoa, hold on." Zidler stood up too, feeling a little dizzy too. He put a hand on her shoulder. "Haven't you forgotten something?"

She frowned. "Forgotten what?"

"That you're pregnant and the last time you walked down the beach you had a horrid asthma attack?"

She shrugged his hand off and crossed her arms. "I feel better now. It's not like it's a long travel."

"Actually," Kay said carefully, "I should just go alone anyway. My legs do feel a bit better now…"

Both Margo and Zidler knew she was lying. Margo opened her mouth, probably to protest and volunteer to sacrifice herself for the better good but Zidler beat her to it.

"You know what? I'll go if he's so important to you."

Kaylee smiled brightly, but Margo seemed to have caught the resentment in his voice, and seemed a little regretful when he walked away into the jungle.

--

"So why you?"

"What do you mean 'why me?'" Owen pulled away a branch and let it slam back in Charlie's face. He groaned and held his nose, glaring at the back of her head.

"I mean why it was just you who had an insane hallucinogenic vision? Why not Locke? He survived the explosion too."

"Who's to say I didn't see anything too?" Locke said with a smile. Charlie swore under his breath. Owen knew he was pretty pissed, why he still joined them on the search for Kate she had no idea. Maybe it was to compensate for being a waste of time and a bad singer.

"Great. You're drug buddies. I'm sure Kate has seen dead people run around here too, maybe even a talking horse! So, where exactly is she?"

Owen frowned and looked up at the clear sky. There were no clouds that she could see. "I don't know."

"Terrific," Charlie grumbled.

Terrific. Yeah, she guessed life was that now. The jungle was so different from her usual stage, from the neon lights blinding her and the crowd screaming for her voice. She did miss it. But the world would go on without her, at least _that_ world would.

This world was different. A struggle for survival, something more she'd learned when she'd gotten kidnapped. But she had to be patient. Ugh, did they really expect her to be able to wait?

The visions, seeing Rosalie in the jungle surely were a sign that things were finally starting for her. That she was now going on that dark, mysterious path to greatness Richard was talking about. But how the hell was saving Miss Everything-Is-About-Me important?

She frowned deeper when she thought of the vision, of Fox in that vision. She kind of hoped the idiot was all right. She knew the Others wouldn't hurt him… much. But still, they hadn't returned.

"Wow," Charlie said and Owen hurried up to his side.

"What is it?"

"It's the – it's the hatch! Or was. I don't really know…" Owen blanked out the rest of his words as she slowly walked over to the edge of the wide crater.

"So it did implode," she heard Charlie say. "But then… how did you survive?"

Owen's lips slowly curled up in a huge grin as she looked down at the remains of the Swan.

"Because we aren't meant to die yet."

----

Okay, so she wasn't the one who usually drank herself senseless, but she damn did deserve it after all she'd been through. Owen knew that somewhere someone had said it wasn't good if you were pregnant, but it didn't matter, not to her.

She woke up once again with a pounding headache, groaning that the world could go screw itself. The world answered with a: "I already screwed you." This was about the time Owen realized she had done the only thing she'd promised herself not to do.

She raised her head from the pillow and looked around for a knife on her nightstand.

"What're you doing?" Sven asked from the other side of the bed.

"Preparing to murder you."

"…I'll go and make some coffee."

----

Owen turned to Locke who was already putting the torch on fire. She turned to the entrance again, looking into the darkness with apprehension. She wasn't even sure this was the right one.

"Caves? So why don't we just go to the caves? That hole is like… It looks like it's gonna crash right in!"

Owen gritted her teeth. "If you're just gonna complain then why did you tag along?"

Charlie mumbled something and Owen didn't bother to ask him to repeat it. She already knew it was some sort of death threat and words Allen would kill you for if you said it to Ellie.

"I saw some tracks, leading here," Locke said. "Big ones, bear ones. And it leads into that cave."

"I don't think you want to come on this part then," Owen said, trying to sound cheerful.

"Absolutely not! I mean," Charlie cleared his throat awkwardly, "I'll stay here. Keep guard."

Owen patted his back. "We're counting on you. The leaves can be very dangerous in these parts of the woods."

Locke chuckled and went into the cave, Owen quickly followed, knowing that Charlie was sulking as they left him.

Soon darkness closed in on them. The flame from the torch gave them little protection from what might be hiding in the shadows. The cave's roof sloped down and they had to walk hunched. She had seen enough movies to be terrified, but in wonder at the same time.

"So what did you exactly see?" Locke asked in a whisper.

"Do you really want to know?"

He nodded. "Yes."

"I had a vision. A strange vision, it wasn't real – and at the same time it was. And at the end, Rosalie showed me where Kate was." She left out the other part about the mother, she wasn't going to tell anyone about that.

"Showed you?"

Owen looked away, feeling embarrassed but she didn't know why. "It doesn't make sense, I know."

"It's all right," Locke said reassuringly. "I know that this island is special, different. Some things just can't be explained –" Locke stopped walking, lifting his feet and looking down at a small, yellow toy truck he'd almost crushed under his feet.

"That is freaky." Owen bent down to the ground and picked it up. "It's a child's toy. Think a kid got lost in here? Like Hansel and Greta?"

Locke smiled faintly, but Owen could see the confusion in his eyes. "You know who Hansel and Greta are?"

Owen raised an eyebrow. "Who doesn't?"

Locke's eyes widened and he reached out with the torch. She turned around, dropping the toy when she saw what he was looking at.

A dead polar bear lay in a corner of the cave, its fur muddy and bloody but it was still white. It was so unbelievably huge, so close and all her instincts told her to run the fastest she could the other way even though she knew it was dead.

Owen stared at it, wide-eyed and frightened. "That's a polar bear."

"Yes it is," Locke answered, sounding so calm.

"Polar bears don't usually skip around on pacific islands."

"Dead people don't usually talk, but recently you've had more than a few conversations with one."

He walked away from the polar bear and she followed quickly, chasing the light, not wanting to be left alone in the darkness.

--

"I can't b-believe you agreed to it," Fox mumbled and they both pretended not to hear him.

"We'll wait here by the tree line," Andrea said, "on both sides of the dock. When they come we just shoot, take two of them captured –"

"Why two?" Kim asked a little confused.

"One to convince the other," Andrea said apologetically.

"Shouldn't someone guard the boat, just in case?"

Andrea nodded slowly in agreement. "Yeah, you and I stay here and Fox stay at the boat –"

"Why d-do I get to stay at the boat?"

Andrea and Kim look at each other. "Well," Andrea said finally since Kim refused to speak, "you're not exactly –"

Fox straightened his back. "I can fight."

Both Kim and Andrea looked at him with disbelief.

Fox blushed. "I mean, I'm a b-better shooter than b-both of you."

Andrea waved with the gun in her hand. "You know how to use it?"

Fox snatched it from her. "I do."

--

"Bloody Dom," Zidler muttered under his breath, just barely avoiding falling down a gritty slope. His irritation didn't have to do much with Dom himself, more with how Margo acted around Dom. Even though it was a bit of Dom's fault, if he just could stop trying to be so charming all the time maybe she would be able to think straight. Or, well think more about Zidler.

He wasn't exactly sure how far from the camp he was. He'd stopped seeing the traps that surrounded it about half an hour ago.

He should've brought some water. And it didn't get easier with the burning sun on his back, but he'd just wanted to get away from them – her – Margo. He hit a rock and felt a little satisfaction when it fell down the hillside.

He heard someone groan angrily and quickly peered down the edge of the hill. There, past the long vines reaching to the ground below Eko stood, looking confused and touching his head where the rock had fallen.

"Uh, hey! Sorry." Zidler didn't really know what to say. "You all right?"

Eko didn't answer, but he opened his mouth and pointed to it.

"You wanna eat? I don't got some food but –"

Eko shook his head; making wild gestures with his hands in the air, then pointed at his mouth and shook his head again.

"You can't talk?"

Eko nodded.

"Uh, okay. I'm gonna find a way for you to get up here. The camp's not so far from here, I'll be back with help as soon as I can!"

He raced into the jungle, and missed the voiceless words that told him not to go.

--

Water dripped from the ceiling of the cave and Locke was careful to keep the torch out of its way. They weren't much underground, sometimes there were cracks above that let a little light flood in and help their way, but it still felt like with every step they lost their chance to go back.

"I know she's here," Owen said, to herself more than to anyone else. She had to be. She felt it but she was also afraid and right now the vision began to feel more like some kind of weird dream than something real. "I know she's here."

"That polar bear. It had been killed recently," Locke said, breaking her chant.

"How recently is recently?"

"Very recently," he said, ignoring her huff. "The blood – it hadn't died naturally. Not from falling off a cliff, or from rocks falling down on it."

Yeah because that's _natural._"What're you saying?"

"I'm saying that something, an animal, must have killed it. And what sort of animals can kill a polar bear? And why kill it, without eating it?"

"The million dollar question," Owen mumbled, trying to shrug his words off. But inside she was freaking terrified. She imagined some Godzilla like creature killing the polar bear and that was so the last thing that the island needed. Or maybe that was the missing puzzle to its craziness.

"Just attempting to have a conversation."

"Well, if a conversation includes you trying to scare me to –"

A loud cracking noise was heard from above them and Owen looked up. It looked like someone was drawing a line in the cave's roof… Holy Floyd the roof was crashing down!

All Owen did was scream. Hold up her arms to cover her face. Even though it was useless. Even though nothing could protect her from the rocks.

Owen blinked and realized that despite the loud crashing and the ringing in her ears she was alive. She coughed and tried to sit up, but someone was holding her down.

"Bloody hell," she swore, but she could barely hear her own words. She removed Locke's arm from around her, _he just saved my life._ She groaned, touched her forehead and felt that the wound had again been opened and blood was trickling down her face into her mouth.

"Locke! Locke!" The ringing continued, and she couldn't see in the now complete darkness but she knew he was there beside her. She was shaking him. "Locke! Wake up!"

_What if he's dead?_ She swallowed at the thought. He could be dead already, didn't matter really, if he was alive he would die anyway if they was trapped.

_Giving up now are we?_

She struggled up on her feet and knocked her head against the roof. She winced and trailed her fingers against the wall; she felt rocks under her hands and realized that was the way they came from. Maybe the cave continued the other way. But she couldn't _see._

She kneeled to the ground again. "Locke, Locke where are the matches?" He didn't answer her and she slid her fingers over the ground until she found the torch. "Locke?" she repeated.

She heard him cough, at least she thought she heard him cough, the ringing was still freaking noisy. She laughed with gratitude, since, well, she didn't want to die alone.

"Owen?" she heard him say.

Owen wiped away some blood from her brow and answered, "Right here. Do you have the matches?"

Locke coughed again and she could hear him groan in pain. "Yes, yes they are here…" His hand found hers in the dark and she took the matchbox from him. It took a couple of tries but in the end she got the torch on fire.

"That's not wise," Locke said hurriedly and she could now see him from the light He was reaching out with his hands and his face was streaked with dust and blood. "It will suck the air out right away."

"No it won't."

Locke frowned and Owen pointed further down the cave where the tunnel continued. "The show always goes on. "

----

Owen held the steering wheel tight in her hands. At the moment it was the only thing to keep her from falling. She was sitting in her car, so falling wasn't literally, but it felt that the moment she stepped out of that car she would crumble into tiny pieces.

She told herself it was easy. All she had to do was go into the building and…

It wasn't that easy. Before, if she'd gotten knocked up she would have had Sven (the bastard) to rely on but now it wasn't that way.

It would surely make great headlines if someone saw her there. LATEST NEWS: OWEN CHAUNCEY SEEN COMING OUT FROM AN ABORTION CLINIC!

There would be lots of theories about who was the daddy and hate mails from religious nuts.

She took a deep breath, ready to open the door and… well, she didn't know if she would run the other way or enter the building, when suddenly a group of people came marching down towards her car, holding placards in their hands.

She froze, staring at the words about babies and life; they didn't stop by her and just walked on until they were in front of the building. Silently they held their protest in the air.

When she drove off, her car arriving into the wild traffic with shouts and loud thuds of music, she realized she was crying.

----

Andrea had no choice but to accept the fact that Fox was better than both of them at shooting. It wasn't the biggest accomplishment if you put it into perspective, Kim was afraid she would shoot someone which kind of was the point and Andrea wasn't precisely Rambo herself.

"Guard the boat," Kim muttered. "They won't even reach the boat."

"They will," Andrea said. "If they kill us you'll have to get down as many of those bloody bastards you can."

"I love that you're such an optimist." Kim smiled.

Andrea hugged her. "I love you too," she said in a low voice. When she pulled away from the embrace she saw Fox watch them with a strange expression. "Don't worry, lad. I'm not trying to steal her away from you." She grinned at him but Fox turned away from them, gazing out at the sea.

"You sure you want to be stuck with a loner like him?" She knew they'd kissed, not exchanged wedding vows but still… Kim was so… _cheerful_ and all Fox did was brooding.

"I'm supposed to guard the boat, remember?" Kim had completely failed to notice her point, Andrea sighed, everyone did.

--

Zidler barged into the camp, panting, shouting something that no one understood. It took almost fifteen minutes until they understood what he was trying to tell them. And then it was too late.

Eko knew speech wasn't necessary to communicate. But he felt lost without it. For this time, his muteness was not by choice, but by the force of something unknowing, something like the island. How he had gotten there – to the bottom of the hill he did not know. He couldn't ask and he didn't need to. He was alive, that mattered. How he got there… some things just weren't mean to be explained.

Then the air had changed around him. Fear rose inside of him even though he was alone. Out of the corner of his eye he could only see trees, rocks that had been broken down from the cliff, red flowers growing wildly between the long grass. He didn't underestimate beauty, and the island was beautiful. But there was an underlying darkness around him that knew had gone from suspicion to confirmation.

A sharp pain. He looked down at the rock that'd fallen down on his head, then up at Montgomery – Zidler who was uttering an awkward apology.

Should he warn him? He tried to, but Zidler didn't understand. Wanted him to speak when he couldn't. He tried to stop him when he left but he was blind to his tries.

And then the sounds. It wasn't natural. Metallic clangs, a screeching howl. The fear he had felt was now gone. It was like he had been waiting for this a very long time.

Slowly he turned around and he didn't change his expression the slightest as he came face to face with the dark entity. Thick, black smoke that flashed bright white with images from his past and he _looked._ He didn't turn away. He didn't look away.

If this was his end he would go with no fear.

"The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want," Eko began to cite. The black smoke stopped flashing and became eerily silent.

"He maketh –"

Eko screamed as the black smoke surrounded him and gripped him tight.

"He was right down there. He couldn't talk; I heard some weird sounds and hurried as soon as I could – do you think it was he that screamed?" Zidler said, panicking.

"I know," Bonnie said without having listened to his words. She, Zidler and Jin were running fast through the jungle. They had been walking at a slow pace when suddenly they'd heard the sounds that made Jin say: "Monster".

Bonnie was glad she'd brought a gun with them.

"There it is!" Zidler shouted. Bonnie reached the edge of the hillside and looked down. She took a shivering breath when she saw the beaten form of Eko down there.

"He… but he was okay, he was… what happened? He was okay, but, how…" Zidler stammered, staring down in terror.

Bonnie swallowed, trying hard not to break down too. "We gotta find a way down there."

Jin pointed at one side of the hill and said something in Korean.

"You think we can climb down there?"

"Climb?" Jin said, looking confused for a second and then he nodded. "Yes, climb."

Bonnie didn't shout to Eko, because if he didn't answer… She swallowed again, this time trying to prevent the tears from falling.

"I'll go first," she told them. Zidler wasn't paying to attention to her. He was mumbling to himself.

She grabbed the vines and carefully steadied herself against the hill's wall. She took a deep breath and began to slowly climb down. Her palms became red, almost bloody with the effort and she laughed with relief when she hit the ground.

To her surprise Zidler hurried before Jin down the cliff, almost falling at the beginning. Zidler glanced down and saw her looking at him.

"Go!" he shouted and Bonnie snapped back to reality. She hurried over to Eko's side. He looked even more horrible now. His eyes were close, his face painted with blood. His shirt was ripped apart, bloody and bruised.

Bonnie broke into a sob, placing her shivering hand on his. She heard Zidler stop behind her. His silence even worse than his mumbling.

Then Eko's eyes fluttered open.

She gasped, letting go of his hand quickly. "Eko?" she said carefully.

Eko made a rattled noise, looking at something behind her, his mouth trying to form words.

"What is it?" She heard Zidler fall on his knees beside her and realized that Eko wanted to speak with him.

Zidler seemed to have realized it too and he lowered his head to hear the small whisper. When he leaned back, his eyes were wide and terrified.

"What did he say?" Bonnie whispered.

"Nothing," said Zidler. "I couldn't hear."

"We need to get him out of here."

--

She'd first gasped, in awe of the beautiful sanctuary at the end of the deep tunnel. But the awe had turned to dread when she looked up and realized that there was no way they were going to be able to climb up the vertical hillsides. Far up she could see the tree branches, the sky and the sun shining down into the deep pit in the hill.

"Oh no," Owen whined, still squinting up at the sky. Locke didn't say anything but walked over to the small stream of water that ran down from a river above continuing into the labyrinth of caves in every side of the hill surrounding them.

At least there were no skeletons lying around in the grass.

"We're never gonna get out of here." Owen made a frustrated sigh and slowly walked over to where Locke was drinking greedily from the small river.

"There are many more tunnels around us," Locke said, wiping his mouth and pointing at the entrances around them. "Kate should be in one of them."

"Yeah." Owen nodded. "_Or_ we'll get eaten by a cave monster or starve to death. Wait…"her voice trailed off when she realized what he said. "Kate?"

"The reason why we are here," Locke said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Kate, you said she was here."

"Yeah… well." Owen crossed her arms. "That was before the sky came crashing down on us."

"Tell me if I'm wrong," Locke said, "but are you regretting this?"

"Hell, yeah!" She caught a distorted reflection of herself in the water, but even in the ripples she could see that she looked horrible. She swallowed and turned to Locke again, who didn't look much better himself. "Almost getting crushed to death 'cause of some stupid hallucination wasn't really the way I planned to go."

"You seemed very sure of yourself when you said it was a vision, that it was true." Locke was as calm as ever.

"Why did you believe me?" she spat.

"Because, Owen," Locke said seriously, "you weren't the only one who saw something out in the jungle."

Owen unconsciously took a step closer. "What was it?"

"Someone – something told me that I had to help you – but not just _you. _As you told me before when I asked about the vision, it's hard to explain, but I got the basics."

"Ever think it was just 'cause of the explosion and you got a concussion?"

Locke laughed. "We both know it isn't like that. We should rest for a while, then continue on. Charlie is probably getting help as we speak so worrying about getting out of here is useless."

Owen wondered if she should say sorry; apologize for bringing him into the mess. But no, it was a free country. It wasn't like she'd forced him by gunpoint. She sat down on a rock and began to hum for herself, watching the sky turn darker above her.

"What was that?" Owen yelped, interrupting the peaceful silence between them. It was almost night now, none of them had the strength to go anywhere but now she was up on her feet, looking in every direction for the source of the voice.

Locke frowned and she knew he heard it too, the whispers. A chill went through her spine, there were only fragments of words she got, her name, someone else's… something with an 's', island, cave, boat, boy.

_Owen. _

It was louder than anything else, and it seemed to be coming from the cave entrance on her right side.

"Where are you going?" Locke shouted, the whispers fading away. Owen grabbed the torch and walked in a fast pace into the cave.

_Owen. _

"Why, to follow the creepy bodiless voice of course." Owen smirked, but she felt everything but secure. She heard Locke hurry to catch up with her.

The tunnel slanted deep down and she had to be careful not to slip. It was a wonder she didn't have any serious injuries, but if you were meant to be alive she guessed you were meant to be okay from falling rocks and other things like it.

The ground abruptly turned flat again and she almost tripped. She dropped the torch on the ground. Swearing and hoping the flame hadn't died too much she bent down and picked it up.

That was when she saw it. Above her on the cave's roof pale red paintings shone from the light. She wasn't stupid. She recognized the strange marks, it was hieroglyphs, but she wasn't exactly familiar with what a drawing of wavy things meant.

Standing up, she realized that she couldn't hear Locke's steps behind her. She held the torch in a tighter grip, praying, well, _sort of_ praying (she more likely threatened it, even though she knew it was a torch and not a person) that it wouldn't burn out.

"Locke?" she whispered in a shaky voice, looking over her shoulder. "You there?"

She whirled around as she heard a whimper, swore as her hair almost caught on fire. Locke wasn't the whimpering type. Hell, he'd almost gotten crushed by stone and he'd barely made a sound.

Tentatively she walked further into the tunnel with the hieroglyphs. The whimpers were small, sometimes she thought she'd imagined them but then there it was again.

"Hello?" she asked louder into the dark. "Anybody?"

The whimpers got louder; she heard the sound of someone taking a step, then a louder sob. She held the torch far in front of her. "Hello?"

She gasped when the person came into view. Kate's eyes snapped open; she covered her face with her hand, away from the light. She was sobbing, there was blood on her left leg and it looked swollen and bruised. She made more cries and she realized she was trying to speak but Owen couldn't understand what she was saying.

She fell down to her knees and with surprising gentleness took her hand. "Look, it's me, Owen. Sure you can remember a face like this and eyes like that." She smiled, hoping it didn't look like a grimace.

Kate shook her head. "I… I c-can't hear you." Her voice sounded broken, too loud. She touched her ear. "I can't hear anything!"

Owen didn't know what to do. She held the torch in one hand and if she put it out to help Kate stand up they would lose their only light.

"Locke!" she screamed, not caring if there was a lurking monster in the shadows that could hear them. "Locke! Help!"

She continued to shout as she sat down beside Kate. It was not like she could hurt her hearing any more. She took a pause from screaming and asked, "Can you stand?"

Kate shook her head. "What?"

"Stand," Owen gestured with her hands and rose up, "you know, on your feet."

Kate closed her eyes and with a cry she got up on her feet. Owen caught her just in time from falling.

"Not that bad. No worse than Charlie's voice then." Owen's voice sounded cheerful but she wasn't even smiling. Kate couldn't see her that well anyway.

"Ringing," Kate groaned, leaning onto Owen, "in my ears, won't go away."

"Always something to complain about. Come on. Is it okay if I scream more?"

Kate seemed to have understood her and nodded, maybe it was getting better. Owe hoped so, she wouldn't wish deafness on her worst enemy. What was life worth when you couldn't hear music?

"LOCKE!" Owen screamed, but then Kate gripped her arm tighter till the point of pain. So that was the thanks you got from her? "What?" Owen spat.

"The roof," Kate said, and it was all that was needed. Right, maybe it hadn't been the smartest idea to scream in an unstable cave. But to hell with it if she was gonna help Kate all the way back on her own.

"Owen!" she heard Locke scream, just when she was thinking about dumping Kate there. Rosalie said nothing about dying trapped in a cave forever. She laughed in relief, telling Kate that they were getting help. She wasn't a hundred percent sure Kate heard, but she got the message when Locke showed up, staring at them in stunned silence until Owen barked at him to help them.

----

Owen gasped, sobbing hard, trying her best not to start hyperventilating. Rain smattered against the windows and the tears wasn't making it any easier to see. A wave of nausea rolled over her and she closed her mouth.

She couldn't take it anymore. She stopped the car by the road, almost leaping out onto the muddy ground as she threw up.

This was so not what she wanted. This was definitely not as easy as the thought. She closed her eyes, shuddering in the cold. Above her she could hear the thunder and the rain fell like a monsoon. It could drown her for all she cared. Lonely, knocked up, a failure, a mistake, but she wasn't that was she? Not Owen Chauncey. Owen Chauncey proved to the world she was great, different, _special._

And now she was crying alone by the side of a dirty road.

She climbed into her car again, brushing her hair out of her face. It was red now, red like fire in all the blue. She turned on the radio. As she heard the song playing, she took a deep breath and began to sing in a low voice, "_Gotta keep those lovin' good vibrations… A happenin' with her…_"

She went out on the road again, silent tears still falling down her face. She tried to keep her eyes on the road, but looked down now and then. "_Gotta keep those lovin' good vibrations _–"

Another wave of nausea overcame her.

She didn't notice the car behind her until it was too late.

----

"_I'm pickin' up good vibrations – she's giving me excitations…_" Owen sang. She was grateful for a chance to sing a lot, there weren't that much time on the island to do that, and now she had the perfect excuse. Locke had even told her to do it so that Kate could practice her hearing, hear it come back to her slowly.

Kate still almost screamed when she talked though. She explained that she'd woken up deep down there beside the small stream, but that she when trying to find a way out had gotten lost. How she got hurt… Well, Owen still wasn't clear on that.

When Locke had disappeared into one of the cave entrances (he was going to see if they'd started to try to dug them out yet) Kate rolled over to her other side, looking at Owen who was lying flat on her back, staring up at the stars that had began to appear on the dark sky while singing.

"DID YOU SEE DOM?" Kate yelled.

"Yup," Owen said without looking at her, nodding in case she didn't get it. "He was running around starkers in the jungle."

"WHAT?"

Owen rolled her eyes. "NO!" she instead shouted in answer.

"HE WASN'T BACK YET?"

Owen shook her head. "I don't know."

"Owen" Kate!"

Owen sat up quickly. "Locke, what is it?"

Locke smiled. "They've dug a hole."

"As Charlie would say: terrific!" Owen grimaced as she helped Kate up on her feet. In a second glance, the leg wasn't that bad.

Charlie had apparently been helpful in _something._ He'd heard the loud crash when the roof caved in and had been smart enough to go get help immediately. Owen was surprised about how happy she was to see the wannabe pop star.

Kaylee, despite the fact that her legs looked like something that had been badly grilled, was out there waiting for them, throwing her arms around Kate as soon as they were out.

No one hugged Owen.

Kate tried to though.

_Tried_ was the right word.

--

Desmond didn't stop when the day turned to night. He knew he was close. He had to be close. He wasn't very sure where the camp was, but he had a good guess. His thoughts were on good memories, memories of little Lori as a child, when she'd been happy. When she'd smiled and looked like she meant it.

The Lori he'd seen – it didn't look like his sister. He hated to say it, but it looked like she was _dead._ When she spoke though, it sounded like her, with just a little bitterness.

Desmond almost stumbled into something that looked like – but it couldn't be – a ping pong table. Burned around the edges, the net loosely hung up, the mark where he had smashed the racket in one day.

He hastened his pace, what he'd just seen slowly processing in his mind. It wasn't true. He had to find that out. It was true. No it wasn't. He was still in one piece was he? He should never have left. It was all bloody –

True.

He stared down the gaping crater that was all that was left of the hatch. It'd been destroyed. How? What'd happened? Only he knew how to!

One important thing that got his mind off his sister for a while was that _he was still alive. _The hatch had gone boom and he was still bloody alive!

He didn't really know why but he suddenly burst out laughing. He laughed until he couldn't stand up, kneeling down on the ground and laughed crazily until tears welled up in his eyes. But he couldn't stop.

Three bloody years gone and wasted.

"Dude, when you're done laughing madly like some kind of evil doctor, could you hand me some clothes?"

Desmond, still on the ground looked over at the trees. He stopped laughing and picked up his flashlight.

"Some privacy?" the man, Ring Girl's guy yelled. Desmond pointed the flashlight to his face instead.

"What happened to you, brother?" Desmond asked, wiping away a tear of laughter. "What happened to the Swan?"

"Both things are kind of connected," the man said – Dom was his name. "Long story short, found your fail-safe key, blew it all up and somehow woke up in the jungle like this."

"Naked? The explosion blew off all your clothes?"

Dom made a disgusted face. "You want me to explain this freaking island's magical powers? Do you got some clothes or not?"

--

Kim would rather be out there with Andrea and Fox. Not sitting alone inside the boat, hidden in the dark with her thoughts. Every sound scared her, except for the sound of the waves rolling under her feet. It was a small comfort in the fear. Water, always connected with her happier memories.

She rose to her feet, walking back and forth in the small space. She looked at the bed where she'd put the gun. Boone, the guy she'd shot still hadn't returned. He was still with the Others.

She swallowed and tried to keep her mind away from it.

Then she heard the sound of small steps from above.

"Fox?" she squeaked, her hand trailing after the gun and grabbing it.

No one answered. Maybe she'd imagined it.

Then she heard someone climb down the ladder.

She began to walk backwards slowly. If it was them it meant that Fox and Andy were…

She held the gun tighter in her grip. And walked right into the door to the small bathroom.

A flashlight blinded her. "Who?"

The person standing in front of her was definitely not Fox or Andrea. He was dark, but his eyes were darker, black and piercing as the darkness. When he saw her he frowned, but then he smiled.

He had a gun in his other hand.

"Don't come any closer!" Kim hoped she looked convincing as she pointed her gun at him.

He lowered his own. "Hey, why don't you point the gun the other way, sweetheart? Someone could get shot."

"Let me off this boat."

His smile faded a little, almost to the point of pity. "Sorry, no can do. And before you get any ideas of tryin' to fire that thing in my dashing face you should realize I got a whole group of friends up there that wouldn't hesitate to ruin that pretty face of yours too, we're kind of 'an eye for an eye' people."

"You killed them?" Kim's voice shivered.

"Nope," he answered cheerfully. "We didn't kill your friends, Kimmy, we can't, orders y'know. Good orders too, otherwise many would've wanted to lay their hands on Fox."

"How do you know my name? How do you know _his?_"

"Read it. I learned that in school. And his name… he told me so one day."

"You're lying."

"No, really I did go to school –"

"About him!"

He took a step forward. "Have you ever asked him why he was on the plane, _if?_"

Kim didn't answer and he took it as an invitation to take another step closer to her. "Now, lower the gun and we can continue on this conversations like civilized people. I'll go first," he held out his hand, "I'm Jim."

"I'll shoot you if you don't let me off this boat!"

"I'm truly sorry but I can't."

Those bastards were good at acting too. He almost looked like he meant what he said. "I will kill you."

"Aww, Kimmy, we both know you're not a murder –"

She heard voices, shouts and realized they'd heard her. She hadn't heard the gun go off. She hadn't heard anything. Nothing of this was even happening she told herself. It was a dream. Not real. She hadn't just shot anyone on purpose.

But there Jim was, on the floor with red and red and red spreading through the pale blue of his shirt.

When a bullet flew over her head she snapped out of it. She ran back, throwing the bathroom door open. She climbed up on the sink, trying desperately to open the small window.

She heard whoever had been shooting at her run her way. She turned around to close the door and slipped. _Fear_ rushing through her in a way she never knew it could. _Pain_ as she hit her head in the wall.

She tasted blood, dirt on her lips and suddenly everything was too small as her follower tried to grab her. Tried to make her stand up – tried to kill her she didn't know. She just pushed him back against the wall with strength she didn't knew she had. She heard the click – the click of a gun and bent it out of his fingers.

He grabbed her neck but she bit him. She pointed her gun at him in the awkward angle, trying to pull the trigger.

A roar came from underneath her feet. Surprising the both of them as the boat began to move forward. She reacted first and fired into his gut.

There was blood on her hands when she crawled out through the small window.

"THERE SHE IS!" someone yelled.

The boat lurched. She dropped the gun. Another shot rang out. She stumbled and she fell over the reeling down in the water.

--

"Then they told me to go back to the camp, to tell you that you could never go there and they said that if I didn't do that they would kill my sister," Desmond said, finishing the story.

"Man, that's some crazy _Twilight Zone_ right there." Dom shook his head, now only half-naked after Desmond gave him a pair of pants. "Don't worry too much though, we can handle it."

"How can you?"

Dom shrugged. "We got an army. They don't know we got an army. We got a freakishly pissed off leader with mood swings – I'm saying our chances are good."

"Leader? You mean the doctor – Jack?"

"No, I'm talkin' about Bonnie. Blonde, beautiful, bitchy."

Desmond frowned, but decided to let it go. "Just didn't realize she was your leader. Dom, when we were out on the dock – there was a flash of bright light. Was it you, was it from the hatch?"

"I think. Don't know."

Desmond grabbed his arm and they stopped walking.

Dom raised an eyebrow. "I'm okay with people checking out the goods but sorry, I don't swing that –way –"

"How did you know, Dom?" Desmond interrupted him. "How did you know where the fail-safe key was? How did you know how to use it?"

Dom chuckled. "It's a _key._ Everyone knows keys go into locks."

"You listen to me, brother. There were only two people who knew of that key, one is dead and the other one is me so…" His voice trailed off, and his eyes widened. "Unless… are you him?"

"Who?" Dom asked in a tone that clearly showed that he thought Desmond should be locked in.

"_Him._ What did one snowman say to the other?"

"You are freaking crazy?"

Desmond let go of his grip. "Still doesn't explain how you knew."

"I just knew, okay!"

"Just knew?"

"Okay, maybe I didn't 'just know'." Dom sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Someone – told me."

"Who?"

"Long story," Dom said, looking sheepishly at him.

"I'm tired of these damn cryptic answers!"

"Well," Dom spat, "welcome to our part of the island." He brushed past Desmond onto the beach, marching over to the first set of tents in the outskirt of the camp.

--

Fox realized they had once again tricked them, but then it was too late. The boat was too far away already and Kim was nowhere to be seen.

It didn't stop him from trying though.

"KIM!" he shouted. "KIM!" He was at the end of the long dock, trying desperately to make his voice be heard over the waves and over the now endless distance between him and the boat. She had to hear him. She had to hear his voice and know that he would save her.

"KIM!" he screamed again.

"Fox!" It was small, desperate but it was her voice.

Andrea sighed in relief, pointing her flashlight over the water. Suddenly they saw her; she was swimming, strangely fast towards them.

Andrea and Fox helped her up on land. She fell into his arms, water dripping off her. Andrea gave him a blanket and he wrapped it around her.

Then he realized she was sobbing against his chest.

"S-sorry, so, so sorry."

"It's okay. It's – it's okay."

"No, no, no, _no._"

"It's okay," he repeated as he and Andrea helped her away from the dock. It felt like they were safer with trees surrounding them and then they sat down again. Andrea silently gathering the little things they had in preparation and Fox holding Kim close as she got over the first shock.

Kim stopped sobbing, but she still didn't say anything. Fox didn't ask.

Andrea did though, maybe it was because she couldn't stand the silence, "Do you want to talk about it?"

Kim shook her head. Andrea let it go with that, mumbled something about getting Fox's backpack and left them alone.

For a while they just sat like that, together. Kim shaking and Fox silent. Silent because he didn't know what to say, because he was afraid what she would answer if he asked.

"Fox," Kim finally whispered, "why were you on the plane?"

Fox froze. "Um… c-conference. I was at a conference."

"Where's the rest of the conference?"

"In Sydney. I d-decided to go back early, my friend Jim w-was mad about that." He laughed nervously at the end.

"Oh," Kim whispered, slowly pulling away from him.

Fox opened his mouth to say something more but was interrupted by Andrea who threw his backpack at him.

"Are you ready to go back, Kim?" she asked, lending a hand to help her up on her feet.

Kim nodded, glancing at Fox. "Yeah, I'm ready."

--

_Take it with you._

Owen weighed the satellite phone she'd stolen in her hand. The survivors had mostly forgotten about it, with the news of Jack and the gang's abduction, the Austen siblings return and the hatch explosion. She put it into her backpack along with another bottle of water.

"You going somewhere?" Owen looked up and saw Charlie. He was holding Aaron in his arms, and by Lennon how the boy's blue eyes were like his mommy's. "Just asking since last time you went on a trip it ended up with a cave crashing in. Wouldn't want you to get hurt, would we?"

"I know you do want me to get hurt, Pace. And no, I'm not going on another one of those suicide trips. I'm actually just going to get some water at the caves."

"Oh."

Owen stood up, swinging the backpack over her shoulders. "Oh, yes. See you later."

"Hopefully never," Charlie mumbled when she left.

Owen smirked. He had no idea how right he could be.

----

Owen woke up, as with every other day with a swearword and promise to murder the first person in sight.

"Good to see you're okay. I'm gonna go and get some water," she heard Sven's voice say, and fading steps as she walked away from her. Her body felt stiff, a beeping sound that had penetrated her dreams continued on now in her wakened state.

Bloody wonderful. She was in a hospital bed.

A wave of panic went though her body. Her voice was hoarse, more like wheezes than words but a nurse turned around when she heard her making noises.

"Your manager explained everything, right darling?" she said gently. "You are going to be fine."

Owen shook her head. "Pregnant."

"Yes, I know." The nurse frowned. "Didn't he tell you? The fetus is fine, there were some complications but they have all been sorted out. He even asked me for some pamphlets about abortion."

"Abortion?"

"He said you had been discussing it."

Owen closed her eyes and nodded slowly, trying her hardest not to cry.

----

A thousand of different images went through his head, most of them involved every stereotype and Indiana Jones movie about jungles he'd ever seen when he opened his eyes.

He wasn't in a spider web (that would've been kind of cool), but was lying on something far more sharp… and root-ish. He blinked and saw the sky above him, weird that there weren't any branches covering it, as you supposed it would do in a jungle.

That's when he realized that he was in fact on top of a branch.

He gave out a small scream, holding onto the branch for dear life. His parachute had gotten tangled up in the tree's mess and that was the thing holding him up. At least he wasn't dangling upside down, that was an upside in the middle of the madness.

"Help… help…" he whimpered in a small voice, trying desperately to pretend he was somewhere else than _stuck in a tree._ "Help!"

"Whoa!" he heard someone say from below him. He tried to look down, but all he saw was a shadow. His glasses must've fallen off.

"Help me!"

"I'm going to, hold on. Seriously, how'd you get up there?" There was laughter in the voice, the girl's voice he assumed. It sounded familiar but he couldn't quite place it.

"Helicopter." He turned his head to the side, and through the blur he could make out a form of a person. She'd climbed up in the tree he realized.

"Good thing I stole one of Locke's four hundred knives," she said to herself. "Be careful when you fall."

"When I fall –?" He screamed, dropping from the tree branch and he crashed into the long grass underneath. He groaned and took off his helmet. It'd probably saved his life.

He heard a thud of someone jumping down, and then he felt something sharp against his cheek. "These your glasses?" he heard her say.

"Thank you." He gratefully put them on, miraculously they weren't cracked and he could see clear again.

He could now see her.

She helped him up on his feet. Her eyes – one was blue and the other one was green stared into his own.

"Thank you," he said again. "I – I know you must be wondering who I am –"

"Not really," she said with a shrug. "I already know who you are."

He blinked. "You do?"

She smirked knowingly. "Sure, you are Frederic Phelps."

"How – how do you…" Suddenly he saw that she was holding something, a satellite phone, _his_ satellite phone. He tried to grab it but she held it out of his reach.

"Finders keepers. This is mine now. You don't need it. By the way, the camp's right over there." She pointed in between the trees. "Be careful though, they've set up millions of traps in the course of two days, they won't likely trust you, so you should take this." She took off her backpack and opened it, picking out another satellite phone. "it's broken, I broke it and it _should_ be beyond repair. Show it to them."

"You – you," he stammered as she started to walk off in the other direction that the one she'd pointed at, "are you one of the survivors?"

"Survivors?" She laughed wholeheartedly. "I'm Owen freaking Chauncey, of course I'm a survivor. See you in another life Frederic Phelps."

She disappeared into the labyrinth of slender trees on the other side and left Fred alone with his very confused thoughts.

--

**Author's Notes: **Is it not only Fred, but you who are confused too? Let me know, because I have been told I can get way confusing in my writing and plots and stuff, some things that are obvious to me are just a confusing mess for about everyone who's read anything I've written.

So this was the LONGEST CHAPTER YET. It deserves capitals, yes? I can't believe I wrote this monster. Maybe I should've split it into two parts, oh well, just remember this chapter if I'm late with posting some time!

Other applications are still open and will probably be FOREVER, or… well, until we reach season five into this story. We'll see. So send 'em in if you got 'em.

This chapter 'properly' introduced **Frederic Phelps** submitted by Girafe13. Two characters I'm gonna have loads of fun to write!

I know I got things planned out, but if you got some suggestions please tell me! Character interactions, missions, drama, love, just say!

Thank you all for your brilliant reviews, you have no idea how each one makes me so happy!

Namaste.

REMEMBER MAKE MARGO SAY AFTER SO MANY DAYS! SORT OF.


	35. Wanderers

Wanderers in that happy valley,  
Through two luminous windows, saw  
Spirits moving musically,  
To a lute's well-tuned law,

_Round about a throne where, sitting  
(Porphyrogene!)  
In state his glory well-befitting,  
The ruler of the realm was seen._

_- By Edgar Allan Poe_

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 28, Wanderers **

--

The man gave him the pale yellow folder without a word. He was a regular guy, no one you paid much attention to if you crossed him by the street, except if you looked closely, then you would see the trace of a scar over his eyebrow that separated him from the mass.

He never really spoke unless it was extremely necessary and Sean liked it, the silence. He could pretend that without actually saying it out loud, the things he was doing – would do wasn't really true.

Stupidly, as he was getting out of the car Sean couldn't help but ask, "Is this it?" Which of course it was. He knew that.

The man simply nodded and closed the car door behind him.

Sean sighed placing the folder carefully on the seat next to him. He pulled out his cell phone, and saw that there were three missed calls, all from Sarah.

She would be disappointed in him.

----

Sean blinked against the sun, confused for a few seconds of where he was until he heard a loud, angry scream. He looked to his right and saw Flor, holding her hand and jumping up and down while swearing. She threw a rock at something – he couldn't see clearly what it was – and then she yelled again just as angry. Then, a shout of triumph.

He sat up slowly, still looking over to her. A song was playing loudly from the speakers and she was doing a little victory dance before she picked up something from the ground.

The song ended and Flor stood there like a statue, her eyes fixated on whatever it was in her hands. Then she bowed her head and Sean could hear her sob.

Flor's eyes suddenly met his and he heard her say a small 'oh' when she realized he was awake. She was holding some sort of food – a biscuit – a fish biscuit.

"Are you hungry?" Flor asked awkwardly, smoothing out her dress with one hand and trying to hide her tears. "I can get more if you want."

Sean didn't answer, but pretended to be every interested in the leaf on the ground before him.

"You were asleep when I returned, didn't want to wake you up… They didn't hurt me, though… so… uh…"

Sean looked away. Did she really think he cared?

"I'm sorry," Flor whispered weakly. And he hated it. She wasn't allowed to sound so broken, not after what she'd done. "I know you hate me. I –"

"Up on your feet!" It was the twins again. They both had similar smirks on their faces as they split up and went to open their cages. "You got work to do."

Flor made something that sounded like a yelp. One of them laughed, saying, "You didn't think you would just sit around for one month did…" His voice trailed off as the walkie-talkie sprung to life, a voice coming through.

"Yeah?" The twin held up the walkie, throwing suspicious glances at Flor and Sean while doing so. Sean couldn't hear what was said, but the voice on the other end sounded frantic. "Jim? Hurt? Is he – you're coming here? You mean right here?" he yelled.

Rushing out of the jungle came guards, the Others, and carried by two of them on a stretcher a guy laid. Sean could clearly see he was wounded, shot even. The twins stayed behind, holding their guns out like they expected Sean and Flor to somehow burst out of their cages at the sight of the hurt man.

Sean met Flor's gaze when they left. She was staring at him shocked, her eyes big and round.

"It was us, wasn't it?" she said in a breathless voice.

When the twins took them out of their cages, looking now more furious than gleeful, Sean turned to Flor and nodded.

--

"So you just took over the whole deal, the Barracks, their homes, their creepy sonar-fence thing."

"Yeah, pretty much," Karl replied. He was weighing a long stick in his hands, trying to figure out if it was a good weapon or not, Wendy supposed. She still had the gun, but if they wanted to catch fish, a bullet wouldn't do much good.

Still, there wasn't any water in sight in the first place, so Wendy thought Karl was just wasting his time. But she had a suspicion that he was doing it deliberately, to give her some rest.

"How did you do that?" she asked, leaning back against the tree.

Karl frowned. "The details of the Purge – don't know them."

"You don't want to tell me."

Karl's sheepish face as he looked down was answer enough.

"How about your people? Are you sure you won't miss them?" Are you sure you won't miss _someone?_ was her original question.

"I've lived with them for a long time, they're not all bad."

Wendy snorted, crossing her arms. She knew they weren't all murderers exactly. But the thought of Claire, Brian stuck there with them pained her.

"Like who?"

"Like Maddy, she helped me rescue you; two times it looks like now." He smiled. "I owe her."

"Yeah," Wendy said quietly. "What's the deal with her anyway?" she asked a little louder. "Why would she go, you know, against her people? And why does she speak so _weird?_" Wendy crinkled her nose at that and Karl laughed.

"She doesn't talk that weird."

"She talks super weird."

And Karl still wouldn't answer her questions right on, and Wendy was surprisingly fine about it. She wouldn't stop asking, but she knew that Karl would never tell her anything, and as long as she didn't try to kidnap her again she could live with it.

Sort of.

Wendy stood up again, her throat burning with thirst. "We have to find some water before we die."

--

"I'm not a SURGEON!" Felicity Hale yelled. "I know the basics but he's bad, _too _bad Addie! I can't – I can't –" Felicity stared at Jim's limp body on the table and she swallowed. She remembered laughing when he first asked her out. She remembered kissing him quickly when he left on one of his missions. She remembered ignoring him for months after she found out he'd kissed two other persons that same day.

"Ivan –" she said frantically, turning to the others in the operating room, " – only he can – where is he?" Luke was already dead. Shot by the same girl who'd shot Jim. She couldn't… Not two of them. Not at the same time.

Addie said slowly, "He's with Diane."

Diane closed her eyes for a moment and then opened them again, trying to meet Ivan's gaze. But Ivan was too busy screaming at her, to care, to notice.

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?" He had gotten past the part of denial fast. Skipping over to rage, his face distorted by angry tears, by the slurs he threw out of his mouth. He was curious that way, her brother, so… human. Sometimes he was so pathetic. "You – YOU knew!"

"Of course I knew," Diane answered him coolly.

"Then _why?_ Why didn't you tell me that he was – that Jamie was –" He tried to fight back a sob.

"Because there were more important things to do."

At this Ivan screamed, picking up the chair and throwing it at her. Diane didn't have to move, he had a horrible aim now when he was crying.

After that he stopped screaming, just stood there, staring down at the floor with tears running down his face. Diane remembered once when they had fallen out of a tree when they were children, after a fight over the best apple there. Ivan had been crying, screaming over his broken arm while Diane had sat quietly, watching her brother with faint interest and taking no notice to her sprained ankle.

She tilted her head to the side, just like she'd done then. Like her brother was something interesting inside a showcase.

Interrupting the silence, she said, "I wanted to inform you that we'll be taking Jamie's body down to Hume –"

He was at her again. This time taking even her at surprise. He grabbed her arms. Slammed her into the wall and she yelped, all breath leaving her body and she coughed, suddenly without strength. Ivan let go of her arms to instead rest his finger close to her neck, over her shoulders.

Diane breathed in sharply. "We still have a purpose," she said, her usual drawn-out voice quick. "You can't waste it on being angry. There is no time to mourn, but there is time for some things else. It wasn't me who killed him."

He growled, "Janna –"

Diane shook her head and blinked rapidly. "No, Florence Bluth."

The door flew open, slamming against the wall.

"What the hell is goin' on here?" A tall, black woman stepped inside the room. Ivan released his grip around Diane and took several steps back, almost falling over the chair he'd thrown.

"Lalah," Diane simply said, raising an eyebrow when she saw the blood stained clothes she was wearing. "What are you doing here?"

"I came here with Jim," Lalah replied harshly. "Jim, remember him? The guy you –" She turned to Ivan "– are supposed to be operating on right now. Look, I know Ben got some sort of emotional issues with this whole deal, yeah? And that's why he assigned you to take care of most of it. But it looks like you have to resign for the same thing. That's why I'm here. To put some order to things."

Diane looked away, smirking a little. "Are you sure that's the only reason you're here, Lalah? Are you sure it's not because of a certain… _prisoner?_"

"Did you just hear me?" she almost screamed, obviously Diane had hit a sensitive spot there. "Jim's dying. I thought they radioed you. And you!" she yelled at Ivan. "What are you still doing here?"

Ivan's face was still streaked with tears, Lalah must have noticed it. The news of Jamie's death must have reached her. Otherwise she would have looked a lot happier. Still, just as Ivan always let his emotions show so humorously, Lalah liked to pretend she didn't have any.

"Go," Diane said to Ivan and he left the room. She turned back to Lalah again. "What do you want to start with?"

"The game you're playing on Sawyer."

Diane blinked. "What game?"

--

Sawyer carefully chewed on the piece of meat. It wasn't boar… it tasted a bit like chicken. If he was lucky, they weren't feeding him rat.

He hadn't knocked out the guy who brought him food. The thought had been in his head, his pulse had quickened, the watch had started to beep and the guy had suspiciously stayed. Like he expected Sawyer to drop dead like a fly.

"Do you give Eva any food?" he snapped at the guy who jumped and blushed. "How do you feed her if she's in that room, Twitchy? Do ya got a door on the outside?"

The Other didn't answer him and left. Sawyer growled, dropping the fork on his plate. Now he wasn't that hungry anymore.

He stared at the door. The _other_ door. Leading into the room Eva was in.

_Maybe_ was in. He didn't trust these people. Liars as they were. But she could be. And if she was in there, all he had to do was to open the door, get her and run.

He looked down at the watch and sighed. He guessed he would never know.

--

Wendy happily dipped her feet in the stream they'd found. If anyone asked, Wendy definitely hadn't jumped up and down shrieking and hugging Karl when she saw it.

She splashed the water with her feet and suddenly Karl yelled. Wendy looked up innocently when she saw the water drip off his clothes. "Sorry."

She screamed with laughter when he splashed her in the stream. She felt like a little child again, and when he smiled, his dimples showing, she thought she saw him as he was when he was a child too, still innocent, just a little kid who liked to play and never had to think about how he was going to rescue that fake-pregnant plane crash survivor from his own people.

"WAIT, wait," Wendy panted, taking his arm. "Look!"

He turned around and saw something white disappear behind a rock.

"It was a rabbit! A bunny!" Wendy yelled. "That means food!"

--

Flor watched the quarry around them. People were hauling rocks, hoeing the ground. They were so many. She knew that. She'd seen them when they'd brought her to her trial. She even recognized some of their faces.

"You see those rocks over there?" one of the twins said. "That's where you two come in, you Bluth are gonna chop 'em loose and you Sean are going to haul them outta here." All of his usual snarky behavior was gone, he sounded like he rather wanted to be giving them death sentences. "If you need anything raise a hand." He gritted his teeth, scowling at Flor. "If you try to escape, you will get shocked."

"Shot?" Sean asked. Flor looked at him; he'd refused to meet her gaze since The Nod. She even capitalized it in her head. Would that be all she got from him?

"_Shocked._ I said shocked. If you talk to each other you're going to be shocked. If you touch each other, you're going to be shocked. If you're slacking, you're going to get shocked. If you do anything at all that annoys me, you're going to get shocked. Is that clear?"

"I won't do _anything _for you until I see Ana-Lucia," Sean spat.

The twin smirked. Then he moved forward. Sean took a step back. But it wasn't him he was aiming for. Flor dropped to the ground, crying out in pain because of the taser-like device.

"What the –" Sean protested but the twin threatened with the taser. Flor was still on the ground, clutching her legs to her chest. A dark cascade of hair covering her face.

"Stop slacking." The twin yanked her up on her feet. She winced at the force. "Get to work."

----

Sarah marched over to him, snatched the jacket from his hands and took up his cell phone from the pocket. "Ah," she said, "it's working."

Sean sighed and grabbed his jacket back, hanging it up on a clothing hook.

"Don't you sigh like that," Sarah snapped.

"Sigh like what?" Sean answered tiredly, taking off his shoes and carefully placing them next to each other. Her shoes were carelessly thrown in the middle of the hallway.

"Like I'm the kid here. I called you – why didn't you answer your phone?"

Sean walked past her over to the kitchen, looking around for a glass. "I had it on silence," he said, his voice just a little slurry.

"Are you _drunk?_"

Sean chuckled. He couldn't help it. The way she said it, it sounded like it was the most awful thing in the world. If only she knew.

He was often drunk, why it would upset her more this time that the others he had no idea. Many things seemed to have upset her lately.

Tony had said something that it was probably about her friend's death, Elizabeth.

He finally found a glass and poured in some water. "No," he lied.

"Sean are you –" She was cut off when his phone started to ring. She bit her lip hard, glaring at him.

Yeah, he was pretty much busted.

"Sean O'Donnell," he said into the phone. "Oh. Right. Yeah, yes I'm still in… no… uh…" He glanced at Sarah who now had her arms crossed.

He walked out of the room. This was a conversation he had to have in private.

----

Felicity took one look at Ivan and threw him out of the room. He wasn't going anywhere near Jim in the state he was in. Not that he was upset – he was a wreck – but also because she wasn't sure if he _would _save Jim. Maybe he would even do the opposite.

She'd put her last trust in that he would be eager – he often was – _wanting_ to help. She didn't think that just because of Jamie… It was stupid. But she'd never thought Ivan really cared about anything else than the island. He even seemed to hate his own sister.

But when he'd slowly walked into the operating room. She for one second saw Gregory there instead of him. That was just as stupid, because Gregory and Ivan were as different in their appearance as you could be. But it was enough to scare her more than the fact that Jim was slowly dying.

Gregory had been careless, reckless, at first she'd found it charming, but it had turned out to be dangerous. On an impulse he would book a flight to Paris, on an impulse he would punch her in the stomach.

She wondered if it was an impulse that led him to run out on the street that day and get hit by that bus.

"Why did you do that?" Addie spat.

"He was a wreck," Felicity answered, carefully avoiding her eye.

"So are you."

"You're right," Felicity exhaled deeply, her hands shivering, "I am. I can't do this – but –" Felicity took off her gloves. "I know…" She didn't evaluate further but darted out of the room, ignoring Addie's cries after her.

Addie would be angry, but she always was, so no difference there right? She tried to tell herself that but she knew that she was going to get her back for this.

That didn't matter now. Jim's life mattered.

She opened the door, seeing the man sitting behind the glass wall. He stood up when he saw her, pressing his hands against the glass when he saw the blood.

"What happened?" he asked, "What – is it one of us? What have you done?" he screamed.

"No! No." Felicity shook her head. "Jack… I'm Felicity. I'm… I'm not a surgeon. I'm a fertility doctor and our only surgeon is right now incapable of doing any work."

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked slowly.

She swallowed, pressing her own hands against his, the glass an ironic display of the barrier between them. "One of us got hurt. Badly. He got shot. He's dying and Jack –" a tear fell down her face " – I can't save him. _Please. _They don't want me to ask you but I – I can't watch him die. I don't do death… I do life."

Jack stared at her for a moment and then he laughed hoarsely, shaking his head. "Why the hell would I help you?"

"Because, Jack I know you and I know you fix things –"

He chuckled again, the same cruel tone. "You know me?"

"Jack –"

"Okay." He met her gaze again. "Say I help you, but if I do – I want you to let me go."

"I…" She bit her lip. "I'm sorry, we can't do that."

"Then he'll die."

"Please!" Felicity screamed, banging her hand against the wall. "You have _to._ Jim will die –"

"THEN LET HIM DIE!" Jack screamed back and she stumbled back away from him. Shivering so hard that she thought she was going to collapse any second.

"I…" She had to. She had to save him. But Ben would never let him leave. "I'll let you see Lori."

--

"You made a _knife,_" Wendy repeated in awe, trying to make up a fire.

"You've said that."

"You made a friggin' _knife_!"

Karl chuckled and she smiled. "Yeah," he said, "yeah I did."

"You should totally have one of those nature shows, how to live in the jungle when we get out of here." Wendy thought she saw a tiny spark amongst the firewood. It was good progress.

"Nature shows?"

"Yeah, you know, for crazy people who like to do this for fun." Wendy waved at the jungle around them.

"I guess I don't know so much," Karl said in a low voice, the smile gone on his face.

"Yeah… I guess growing up on a lonely island with crazy people without any way to leave does that," she said a bit carefully.

"Actually, we can. We got a sub…" He closed his mouth.

"What… what do you mean?"

Karl sighed. "Let me help you with the fire."

--

Flor swung the pickaxe, wondering if this was how she would spend her last days alive. She swung it again, wondering if they would let her see her son again. She sighed, wiping sweat off her brow, wondering if he would hate her for dying.

She glanced over to where Sean was working, but he wasn't. One of the twins had given him water. She was so thirsty too.

Sean suddenly looked up, meeting her gaze over the distance between them. He looked down at the bottle, seemingly battling something in his mind before he threw it to her.

She caught it, smiling a little.

And he smiled back.

"Hey!" one of the twins shouted and Flor immediately went back to swinging the axe. "Stop doing that!"

Flor laid it down on the ground and once again hard hands grabbed her and Sean, forcing them away from there.

"Yeah," the twin holding Flor said into his walkie, "we're on our way."

--

Jack looked up, expecting Felicity to enter the room again. Her bright green eyes sad, looking so innocent and pleading despite the blood stains on her hands and on her clothes. He expected her to return, to scream, to beg for him to save this… _Jim. _

It was just a name.

But it wasn't her. Claret came into the room, wearing a sleeveless dress that showed the faint scars on her arms and shoulders. Jack swallowed but walked over to her quickly, stopping only by the glass.

"Hey," he said gently. "Claret, are you all right?" He couldn't imagine what could've happened to her. It was so easy to hurt her; he knew that, because he had.

Claret nodded slowly, looking down at the floor.

"Hey, look at me." She did. "What did they do to you?"

"Oh," she said, sounding like she hadn't seen him there in the room before, like she just caught glance of him. "No… no, Jack. I'm fine. They haven't hurt me."

He could almost hear the 'like you have' at the end.

"Jack…" Claret's voice trembled. "You have to save Jim."

Jack took a step back and she took one forward.

"He's dying, Jack. He's not a bad person. I've met him, he's nice and he's funny and he… he isn't a bad person, I promise you. Please, Jack, help him."

"What did they do to you?" he growled. He couldn't believe – yes he could believe. They must have hurt her, more than the torture to make her say that… unless… no…

"They are not bad people."

"You were one of them," Jack said quietly, and Claret's lip trembled, and she looked down, and that was the horrible, final answer to it all.

"Please, Jack!"

From the beginning she'd been with them. He hadn't been crazy. Everyone had blames him when he'd threatened her, pointed the gun at her but he had been right. But still, it was Claret.

"Why do you trust them?"

"B-because," she smiled weakly, she wasn't happy, but it was all she could do to pretend, "otherwise it would mean I'm crazy."

Jack took his face in his hands, sighing deeply. "Okay, okay I'll do it. I'll save him."

"Thank –"

"On one condition."

She froze, staring at him.

"I want Lori to save him too."

--

Sean was brutally thrown into his cage again. He landed on the dirt, spitting it out and glaring at the twin. He wondered if they were professional trained bullies.

He jumped up, closing his fist. The twin was close enough. He could get a hand between the bars and maybe…

"Why?" he heard Flor say in a startled voice. They were putting handcuffs on her again and she was biting her lip, her wrists were still red.

Why wasn't she also going into her cage?

"Where are you taking her?" Sean shouted. Flor looked so scared. She was mumbling about 'how it wasn't time yet.' he didn't get what she meant. But maybe they were bringing her to the same place where they'd taken her before; she hadn't even tried to tell him where she had been.

"Where are you taking –" A loud, piercing alarm blared through the area. Sean turned around in every direction for the source and even the twins looked a bit stunned.

"It's Jack!" Sean shouted, but his voice was barely heard through the klaxons. Jack was being led past them, towards the big building.

"JACK!" Flor screamed. "JACK!"

"JACK!"

"JA –" One of the twins covered her mouth with his hand, drowning her shriek, holding her tight from moving.

"JACK!" Sean screamed one last time. And Jack turned his head a little – like he faintly heard them – before he was led out of sight.

The alarm was shut off and Flor was taken away too, searching for his gaze until she was too far away to see him anymore.

----

"I told ya Sarah was a bloody hypocrite!" Tony handed him a beer.

"No," Sean shook his head, "she's right."

"About what?" Tony asked and then he grinned when he saw the solemn look on Sean's face. "No way, man. You've found someone better than her haven't you? Finally!"

Sean glared at him. He couldn't understand why Tony disliked Sarah so much. If anything, she deserved someone far better than him.

"It's not about that," Sean said through clenched teeth. The beer can was still in his hand, unopened.

"I'm not a mind reader, mate," Tony said, flashing a smile. "You have to actually _tell_ me things for me to understand."

"I'm…" Sean didn't know how to phrase it.

"…finally breakin' up with Sarah?" Tony said hopefully.

"No," Sean retorted. "I'm in trouble."

"What kind of trouble? Is it I-owe-you-money trouble or…?"

_Worse. Worse. Worse._

"Not like that." Sean was trying hard to find the words. "It's… I got the chance to do something, I got the chance to… earn a lot of money."

"And the problem that makes you make that awful grimace of yours is?"

"Nothing. Forget it. You know, let's go down to the pub instead."

Tony still looked confused, but he still grinned. "That's an idea I like."

They stumbled out of the pub, wasted a long time later, the rain gently falling down on them. Tony called a cab but Sean decided to stagger home, it wasn't that far. And the rain was making him slightly sober.

He fell over an empty can on the street.

Well, maybe not _that_ sober.

He struggled back up on his feet, and somebody lent him a hand.

"Thank you –" Sean said, his Irish accent coming through now when he wasn't controlling it, before stopping mid-sentence, staring up at the man. "Oh, not you," he whined.

"There have been some changes," he said, raising the scarred eyebrow. He held out another folder, thinner but in the same ugly yellow color.

"Who's the bloke we're gonna screw over now?" Sean opened it, not caring about the rain. "Hugo – Hugo Reyes? He got a lot of money, eh?"

"All the information is there," the man simply said.

"Damn," Sean muttered when the man walked away, "one hundred fifty-six million, that's loads."

----

"Have you lost your mind?" A blonde woman grabbed the not-surgeon – Felicity's arm, hard and stared at her. "Bringing him here?"

"He's a surgeon, Addie." Felicity shrugged her off, handing Jack the soap. Jack was keeping his eyes on the x-rays hung up on the wall, frowning. "He can help."

"Wait until Ben hears about this. He'll be furious," Addie warned her.

"Ben already knows," another voice replied.

Jack turned around.

Lori was there. Her hair messy, plastered against her cheeks of tears and sweat. Her unseeing eyes were sunken deep into her skull, her skin paler than ever. She was trembling hard, supporting herself on the woman who'd led her into the room.

Jack opened his mouth – he wanted to say so much to her – but he couldn't.

Lori made a sound that sounded like a sob that broke his heart in so many ways.

"I'm not letting her near Jim," Felicity said from behind him. "I don't care if she got a nurse degree she looks –"

"Hey, Lori," Jack said quietly, finally regaining the control of speech.

"Hi," Lori answered just as weakly. "Hi, Jack."

He took three large steps over to her and pulled her into a tight hug. "It's okay," he whispered.

"No, no it isn't," Lori sobbed into his shoulder. She felt so fragile in his arms, nothing like the Lori he knew. "It's not," she said in a shivering voice, "it's not okay, Jack. You don't know what they've done. You don't know –"

The black woman pulled Lori away from him and he protested but she said firmly, "No more talking."

Jack wished Lori could see him. He wished she could see in his eyes that everything was going to be okay. That he wasn't just saying it to make her feel better.

As he went into the operating room, he looked at her face, pretending that she knew that he had a plan.

And that plan involved fixing the one thing he could.

--

Flor sighed. "Not you again."

Ben smiled faintly. "Hello again, Florence." He nodded to the twins and they left. Ben took the lead as another, big, black guy with a gruff expression kept his rifle ready and pointed at Flor instead.

"Where are we going?" was the first question Flor asked, and it was the one she repeated the most. Ben didn't talk much, neither did the other guy. They walked through the jungle and Flor tried to remember the way in case of an escape route.

The land began to slant upwards, steeply up on a hill. That was when Ben started to talk.

"Where are we going?" Flor asked again for the hundredth time.

"There's something I want to show you."

"And what is that?" The guy gave her a push in the back and she picked up her pace. "Is it another video of my son?"

Ben slowed down. "You sound almost hopeful."

"Why wouldn't I be? If I'm gonna die then…" She bit her lip. "If the last thing I saw was my son then… going wouldn't be so bad."

"If that was the case you would see your son with his new mother," Ben said. "We're there soon," he murmured to himself.

"I'm his mother," Flor replied, ignoring his last words. She said angrily, "I always will be."

"Of course." Ben stopped in his tracks. "But children don't have a large memory like you and I. It is very possible that he will forget. Unless, someone told him about you."

The look he gave her – she couldn't describe it. It was like he was trying to make a promise.

He turned away from her and started walking again. "Not much further, just at the top of the next rise."

They continued up the hill in silence. Flor trying her hardest not to break down in tears again.

"We're here," Ben said slowly and Flor walked the last path herself, coming up next to him on the top.

Flor shook her head. "No…"

There in front of her, over the sea, over the inlet was another island.

"Have you ever been to Alcatraz – take the tour?" Ben asked, but he didn't wait for an answer. "Right now you're standing on a small island roughly twice the size of Alcatraz. And that over there, that's your island, Florence. The one where the rest of your friends are."

"Why are you showing this to me?" Flor asked, shivering.

"Because," he turned to her, "there's no way you can escape. Not without _help._ This is just one big prison. Your fate, one month, it is going to happen. There's no changing that. I need you to understand that."

Flor closed her eyes. "No."

"I believe Claret has already spoken to you about your last arrangements –"

"STOP IT!" Flor screamed and she swung around, away from the island, away from him. She stomped down the hill, hearing the guy yell at Ben about something.

Then she heard the voice on the radio.

"_Ben, Ben? Shephard's gone_ –" the voice broke off and she could hear screams, yells and then a stubborn, loud voice that she so well recognized. "_YOU LET LORI GO! OR HE DIES!_"

--

"– And if I don't stitch that back up in an hour. He'll die."

The gunshot wound had been easy to fix. The guy was going to be fine. But he wouldn't be if Jack didn't fix the small incision he'd made.

"Jack," Felicity said in a warning tone, holding her hands up. The black woman – whose name was Lalah – was fingering on her gun, but he knew she wouldn't fire. He had the strongest weapon. And it wasn't the gun he'd taken off Addie. It was his life. His knowledge.

"You let her –" Jack turned to Lori "– you let her go back to our camp and I will save him. Otherwise he dies."

"Jack," Lori hissed, "are you absolutely insane?"

He chuckled darkly. "Maybe." He pulled off his mask and gazed up at the observation desk. Behind the glass Diane and a man he didn't know stood there. At first speechless when Diane suddenly took up a walkie-talkie.

"No you don't!" he screamed. The man seemed to argue with Diane who was speaking into the radio. "You bring that in here!"

"Jack," Felicity said frantically, looking like she was about to cry, "we can't –"

"YOU LET LORI GO! OR HE DIES!"

At the same time on the other side of the island Flor turned around when she heard Jack's voice. For one moment she just stood there, wide-eyed and scared. Then, she acted.

She grabbed a black stone and slowly sneaked up behind the black man. He swung around but she slammed the stone over his head, grabbing his rifle.

"Florence –" Ben said warningly but made no move to stop her when she turned the rifle at him.

"Give me the radio," Flor spat.

Ben held it out and she snatched it. "Jack? Jack?" she shouted.

"Flor?" All eyes were on him in the operating room, all except for Lori's. She had her arms crossed in defiance. And he was for one moment unsure if she would even run if they let her, just to spite him.

"_Jack! You don't understand. You can't let her go –_"

Jack laughed almost hysterically. "I forgot you were one of them."

"_No, Jack. I'm not. You don't understand – we're on another island!_"

Jack blinked. "What?"

"_We're on ANOTHER DAMN ISLAND, JACK! There is no running away!_"

He looked at all the Others in the room. Diane, looking like she was bored by all of this. Addie, looking like all she wanted was to make sure he died as painfully as possible. Lalah, her face cold, expressionless and her yes lingering on him. Felicity, looking like she was at the edge of tears. The man, looking like all his dreams and hopes had just gotten crushed to pieces. Lori, not looking at him at all.

"Is that true?" he screamed at them.

Felicity and Addie glanced at each other. Felicity nodded slowly, "Yes. Yes it is."

Jack took a deep breath. "Flor," he said into the radio.

But the voice that answered wasn't Flor's.

"_Hello, Jack. It's me, Benjamin Linus. I assume you know who I am since you held me prisoner in your hatch a long time before._"

Instead of a rifle pointed at the back of Flor's head a knife was pressed against her throat, waiting to slit as soon as she made a move. The guy, whose name she learned was Justin, held her hard, leaving more bruises on her skin.

Ben looked directly into her eyes as he spoke into the walkie-talkie, and Flor could only pray Jack made the right decision.

"_I need you to understand, Jack, before you make your decision, that the man whose life you're holding in your hands is a very good person._"

"I've already made my decision. She's getting off this island."

"You _idiot,_" Lori whispered again.

"_His name is Jim Tyberu Al. He grew up in Maine, USA. All the family he had was his mother, Zoe. She's still alive somewhere, knowing that her son is well even though he isn't with her –_"

"You're trying to make me feel guilt? After all you've done? Killed – kidnapped my people!"

"Stop it, Jack. Just stop it!" Lori pleaded. "I'll stay. It's okay, I'll stay!"

"No," Jack told her sharply. "No, you won't." Into the radio he said, "After all you've said I guess he's pretty important. So the deal is still up on the table. You let Lori go off this island, back to her camp and I will fix him."

"_That is a good deal. But not enough._"

"Then what do you want?" Jack asked.

"_There is someone else here that needs surgery. And I need you to operate. No questions. No attempts to wriggle your way out of it._"

"Some girls don't like heroes, I'm one of them!" Lori grabbed his arm. "Don't do it."

Jack looked at her for a long time. Feeling for a moment that it was only the two of them in the room. But he remembered the x-rays he'd seen, and he remembered what mattered.

"I'll do it."

"_Good. Now give Lalah the radio so I can tell the rest of my people."_

--

"Good. Now give Lalah the radio so I can tell the rest of my people," Ben said.

Would Ben really let her go so easily? She wished he would. She wished they all would come out okay. The guilt was eating her up inside.

"Justin," Ben said to the man holding Flor, "loosen your grip around her a little. You wouldn't want her to die this early would you?"

Justin grumbled but did as he said. Flor sighed in relief as the knife wasn't pressing in against her skin as hard as before.

"Now, get her back to her cage. She has no use here. And Justin, do not hurt her." He said the last words while looking into Justin's eyes, threatening.

As she was led away from there, Ben's voice faded. But she could hear him order whoever it was on the other end to get someone called Alex to help Lori.

Flor hoped Alex wasn't a trained assassin.

--

Darkness.

She knew light. There was light. She was blind, but that didn't mean she didn't know warmness, the glory of white. It didn't mean she couldn't see the world around her. She didn't see it as others did, but she saw it in her own way.

But since the Others captured her, put her in that room. All she had was darkness.

Then she was reunited with Jack. Stubborn, idiotic Jack who always thought he knew best. And she could've cried with relief, the darkness wasn't swept away, the screams didn't go away but there was now light too and she wasn't going to get lost in her despair again because if Jack was alive there would always be light.

But the light was only there when she was with him, and now he wanted her to go away. He was even not going to fix a person, let someone die for her. Why? Why the hell would he do that? Lori knew that she wasn't worth it. Sure, she liked to live. But even though the others were cruel bastards she felt, felt in the air and heard in their voices that the guy, Jim, was more loved than she would ever be.

"Some girls don't like heroes, I'm one of them!"And she hoped that if they both got out of it alive, he wouldn't tease her about calling him that. "Don't do it."

He didn't say anything for a long time. The beeping was the only sound; it was not enough to keep the screams to resurface to her mind. She started to sweat. She wanted him to say something, anything. She wanted to cry. She wanted to die. Anything but have to go back there. She was crazy. She was crazy to tell him not to do it. She didn't want to stay. Not with the silence. Not with the darkness.

She was just about to tell him that she'd changed her mind. That she would gladly leave when he said into the radio, "I'll do it."

She was getting out of there, maybe getting out of there. Nothing was sure. Not anymore. What if it all was just a trick? The room. She didn't want to go back to the room. Now when she could get away the thought of going back there made her shiver in fear.

Jack said more things; the man on the other line did too. The others in the room were talking but it all went over her head.

The man on the table was still dying.

What if Jack was wrong? What if he would die in less than an hour? What if she was there when he did?

"NO!" Lori screamed, taking a step back. Jack grabbed her arm, she knew it was him.

"Lori, you will go."

He misunderstood her completely.

"I do. I want to leave. I don't want to stay. I want to leave. I was wrong. I said things I didn't mean. I was stupid. I forgot. I don't want to go back! I can't!" She was rambling and it didn't make any sense.

"I'm here." She heard the door open and heard the voice. It was young, a girl's.

"Good, Alex, did your father –"

"Yes, he did," the girl, Alex, answered in a strained voice. "I'll help her out of here."

"Good," Jack said. His hand was still on her arm. "Lori," he whispered, leaning closer to her, "when you are safe – when you are on your way back to our island, you radio me and tell me so, okay?"

"Okay."

His hand went down to hers and she slipped her fingers into his for one moment before she followed the girl out of there.

--

The darkness was quickly sweeping in. She and Karl had found a small shelter by the edge of a hill, banyan trees as protection on the other side, the two of them lying down in the clearing.

"How was it?" Wendy asked after a long time in a whisper, she rolled to her side and watched the back of Karl's head. "How was it to grow up with the Others?"

Karl rolled around to face her, but he didn't look her in the eye when he said, "It meant you had to do a lot of sacrifices."

Wendy blinked. "What kind of sacrifices?"

"Like leaving people behind. Sacrificing them for the better good."

Wendy froze. "I'm not leaving them behind. Brian, Claire. You know that I'm gonna go back for them, right?"

Karl finally met her gaze. "Wendy…"

"Maybe not right now. But later, when I get back to the camp and tell everyone – I'll go back. I'll save them."

"You can't save everyone," Karl said slowly.

"The hell I can't!" Wendy spat. "They are my friends, and now I know the way in and out of your secret base so yeah, I'm going back."

Karl looked down. "We're the same age."

It was such a strange thing to say, Wendy frowned. "What?"

Karl looked up. "This is the first time you've left someone behind. I think… your life is… was very different from mine. As I said, there are sacrifices. Just recently I had to leave one of my friends behind to leave with you. A little earlier I had to just watch and play along and be silent when I saw a friend I hadn't seen in a long time and earlier than that I saw someone die and I could've done something about it but I wasn't allowed to and then there was that time when…" His voice trailed off after his rambling and he blushed and sighed. "It's…"

"I'm sorry," Wendy said gently. "I don't get it – it was kind of confusing – but I'm sorry. Doesn't make me change my mind though. Claire risked everything to save me, so I'm gonna repay the favor. And Brian is actually kind of nice for a zombie. And it's not only them, there's Rosalie's daughter, Eva –"

"She's not there."

Wendy closed her eyes and took a deep breath. "I don't suppose you can tell me where she is?"

"No."

"You – you are –" She opened her eyes again and found that he'd moved closer to her. So close she could see every little detail in his face. So close that if she leaned forward just a little…

He kissed her, or maybe it was she who kissed him. She wasn't sure.

"Doesn't mean I change my mind," she mumbled and kissed him again.

--

Lori felt it as soon as she stepped out of the building. Not only was it the taste of freedom, of hearing the wind in the trees, of being outside, but it was the scent that hung in the air. A scent that only she could feel. The scent that someone had died, would die, was dying. And it was close to the person sitting in one of the cages on her side.

"Hey, Sean," she said, turning her head to the direction in where she knew he was. "You –" She had felt it as soon as she came out but now when she took a step forward it slammed against her. Sean had been there. He had been there with Ana-Lucia.

She cried out with pain and she heard Alex say they had to hurry. She heard Sean shout something to. She had to stop it. She had to stop feeling so much.

"Lori, what's going on?"

She swallowed, trying to regain her composure. "Jackie is going nuts and bought me a ticket away from here."

"You mean – you mean they are letting you go?"

"We have to hurry!" Alex said again, frustrated.

"Yup," Lori answered Sean. "Sorry that you can't come along."

"I wouldn't want to either. I've gotten used to this cage; it's practically my home right now."

They laughed together, and then Alex tugged at her arm and they were running again.

----

He groaned. Why, why had he woken up? But as he opened his eyes he realized he wasn't as drunk as he thought he would be.

Sean immediately changed his mind when he looked to his side and saw that the other side of the bed was empty, and saw that Sarah was sitting on in the corner of the room, her knew drawn up to her chest and her eyes angry when they looked into Sean's.

"We need to talk," Sarah said sternly.

"Too early," Sean grumbled, closing his eyes again. "Just woke up."

He heard Sarah cross the room quickly, and then a thud as she dropped something on him.

"Ouch," he whined, sitting up. The folder lay on the sheets, open. "Sarah –"

"Care to explain that?"

"You don't understand…" Sean rubbed his eyes, trying to wake up completely. He was so, so thirsty. "It's just…"

Sarah waited for him to explain, her arms crossed and her lip out in a pout. She looked more annoyed than furious exactly.

"How much did you read?" he asked. Sarah didn't exactly have the best of patience, and maybe she'd gotten bored halfway through and didn't really understand what it was all about.

"Enough to understand that you are involved in some pretty heavy things, Sean. I mean, bank accounts, Reyes – I watch the news… sometimes. I know who he is. And remember when I told you about that stalker guy sitting outside our apartment all the time?" Sean remembered that, it was just that… well, Sarah was _Sarah._ He hadn't taken it so seriously. "Well last night I saw you and he talk outside in the rain."

"Sarah –"

"You would recognize that creepy scar anywhere."

Sean froze. She didn't…

"What's going on?" she asked, pleadingly, then with that toneless voice, "Tell me or I'm leaving."

"Leaving?"

"Yes."

"I'm working with him."

She blinked. "Working?"

"Yes," Sean said, "Mr. Reyes got a lot of money, a lot of money that could be used to make things better in this world. I'm trying to get a meeting with him, to talk about in what he should invest in. That guy, Gonzales has been trying to help me out."

Sarah took a deep breath, and exhaled a long, "Ooh." She blushed. "Right, sorry. Really, really sorry. I was just so… I didn't understand it I thought – and I was upset after visiting Ellie's grave so…"

"You still visit Princ – Elizabeth's grave?" Sean said, swallowing, trying not to think of the big lie he had just told her.

"Yeah," Sarah said slowly, "why wouldn't I?"

----

Flor took a deep breath when she saw the cages again. Sean was standing, leaning against the bars, gazing out at nothing at all, barely acknowledging Flor's return. The rain was smattering down, but not enough for it to be painful.

Would she tell him? _Should_ she tell him? He deserved to know the truth, didn't he? Or would he throw the truth in her face, angry that she even dared to say anything? Or would he be angry for totally different reasons, angry that she had killed that last flicker of hope of any escape. But it wasn't his hopes that were getting crushed was it? It was her who had a death sentence.

She bit her lip, drawing blood. She couldn't go so bitter. She had brought this upon herself. Rosalie. Beautiful. Kind. Alive. Until Flor came along and took it all away for _absolutely nothing._

She wouldn't tell him that they were on another island, because Sean also deserved to hope.

Justin opened the door to the cage and released his grip around her arms, pushed her inside.

"That was for trying to knock me out," Justin snarled. "Sorry about getting violent on you, I actually thought you had some decency – didn't believe in all those rumors…"

He swung around as another man entered the area; Flor brushed away her wet hair from her face and saw that it was Ivan.

"You're not supposed to be here," Justin muttered, glancing at Flor. She tensed, standing up slowly. "Ben said –"

"Ben's occupied right now," Ivan answered him.

Justin nodded. "I'll cover for you, then. But Ivan, you gotta understand – orders are orders. And when Ben finds out he's gonna be pissed." Justin walked away into the building but Ivan stayed. Closing and opening his fist like he was deciding something.

Flor's eyes widened in fear and she looked at Sean. What was he going to do?

Ivan slowly strode over to the door of her cage. Flor backed away from him. All her words got stuck in her throat. He opened the door and stepped in. His eyes dark as they stared into hers.

He sent a flying punch to her face and Flor fell to the ground.

--

Claret was lying in the bed, her bed now she supposed. She had just gotten used to the house back at the Barracks until she was ripped away from that too. When she closed her eyes she didn't see the fire, she thought she would be haunted by it at first, but all she saw was the darkness.

And the darkness terrified her even more. The memory of smoke, making her cough and squirm and think that she would never be able to breathe again.

Ben had been understanding… nice, even. He understood that she didn't want her friends to get hurt. But he said some things were even out of his own control.

Like Flor.

But they could never say much aloud, because every time Claret took one step, said one word there was always someone watching her, waiting for her to do a mistake.

Claret stood up from the bed, wiping away the tears that had fallen down her face. She should go and see how the surgery was doing. She hoped that guy, Jim would be okay. She hoped that Jack would forgive her. It was just… no one would ever understand why she was with them. Why she had been since day one. She barely understood it.

She opened the door, the same relieved feeling going though her when she found that it wasn't locked and walked out into the corridor only to bump into someone.

"Sorry," Claret yelped. She looked up and froze when she saw the man's face. The scar over his eyebrow, the same expressionless face. It felt like all color drained from her, all her feelings disappeared and she felt absolutely nothing, like she was nothing more than marble at the sight of the man, the man whose name she'd insisted her grandpa to tell her once. _José Gonzales._

Her father.

----

There was burnt out candle on top of the small grave, he guessed Sarah had put it there. He placed the small bouquet of red flowers on it, feeling a little stupid as he did so.

"So," he sighed, "Sarah forced me to come out here."

The grave of course didn't answer. Did people really talk to graves? He looked around but there weren't many more people in the graveyard. Except for one person, who was walking directly over to him.

It wasn't Gonzales, who liked to show up at the craziest of places, like he was following Sean 24/7. It was someone else, someone he recognized.

"Sean O'Donnell?" the man said as he approached him. His sharp gray eyes looking into his.

Sean nodded warily, "Yes…" Then he recognized him, it was the man from Elizabeth's funeral.

The man smiled. "The friend of a friend?"

"Yeah, I recognize you, but –"

"Simon Bailey," he introduced himself, shaking his hand, "the acquaintance. Was just in the neighborhood, thought I'd visit her grave."

Sean nodded. "Yeah, me too."

They were silent for a while. Simon's eyes were fixated on the inscription on the stone, _Elizabeth Allens. _

"Life sure surprises you," he sighed. "Sometimes when I turn around… I think I see her. The same hair, eyes, her shadow, almost like a statue, it's weird but… it makes you think."

It was weird, and Sean drove his hands down into his pockets, clearing his throat. "I'm having a meeting, nice to see you though, Simon."

He began to walk away, letting out a deep breath or relief over having had it done.

"Did you know her real name?" Simon suddenly shouted, Sean turned around.

"Sorry?" he shouted back.

"Her real name."

"It was Elizabeth –"

"Yeah, yeah, of course." Simon's shoulders slumped, like in defeat and he tried to smile, which only increased how absolutely freaked out Sean was by that man. "Of course," Simon muttered to himself.

Sean was never going to visit her grave again.

----

**Author's Notes: **I need inspiring music, like right now. Do you guys have any suggestions to what I can listen to while writing this? _Or_ of what you listen to while you read this?

And José Gonzales is here! Claret's dad! Scar-over-eyebrow man! Yay! _Finally._

Thanks for all the fantastic reviews! And you know I want more! But really, thank you all so, so much!

Is updating on Lost day/Tuesday good for you? Because then it will become the regular updating day from now on, to infinity! And beyond!

Namaste.


	36. Beloved Physician

The pulse beats ten and intermits;  
God nerve the soul that ne'er forgets  
In calm or storm, by night or day,  
Its steady toil, its loyalty.

_The pulse beats ten and intermits;  
God shield the soul that ne'er forgets._

_So tired, so weary,  
The soft head bows, the sweet eyes close,  
The faithful heart yields to repose._

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 29, Beloved Physician**

--

Margo hadn't been able to fall asleep. Of course it was a bit because of the nausea, but it wasn't just that. Dom, hadn't returned yet and Kaylee and Kate she hadn't seen a sign of him. But since Kate was okay, Owen also, there was a chance that he would be that too.

And then Zidler, Bonnie and Jin had left, running after Eko who was stuck in some ravine. And that wouldn't take so long, would it? But yet they hadn't returned.

To say she was worried was an understatement.

She hung up the shirt on the washing line, smoothing it out while trying to keep her thoughts away from them. They would be all right. They _had_ to be.

She saw something out of the corner of her eye. She swirled around. Her heart clenched in her chest when she saw Dom, and that boat guy, Desmond come out of the jungle.

She laughed, relief overtaking her and she took a step towards them.

But someone else was faster.

Kaylee threw her arms around Dom, almost knocking him off his feet. Margo stopped in her tracks, and Kate, still wounded and shouting when she talked, hugged Dom too.

That was when Margo understood what their return meant.

"Where's Jack? Allen?" She ran up to Desmond but he was still looking down at the ground. "Desmond, Desmond!"

He looked up, looking surprised when he saw her.

"What happened?"

Desmond opened his mouth to say something, but he was interrupted by a loud shout.

They both turned their heads to the sound. And Margo saw Zidler, Bonnie, Jin and… and Eko, Eko lifeless and obviously hurt from so far away. But her eyes were quickly back on Zidler. Zidler's dirty, tear streaked face.

She rushed over to his side. Ignoring whatever Bonnie was saying to her and she took is face in her hands. "Zidler, Zidler are you okay? Are you okay? All right… What happened?"

"Eko," Zidler mumbled. And he looked so tired, like he would collapse any second. So she held him, if he fell so would she.

--

"I'm no doctor," Bonnie said, "but he clearly got a fever."

Eko was lying in his tent, mumbling incoherent words and through his closed eyelids his eyes were moving fast. He was sweating and he was warm all over. They had patched him up the best they could, Sun had made some weird gunk out of her herbs and plants and was trying to give it to Eko, who just wouldn't swallow.

Sun was rapidly speaking Korean with Jin, and Bonnie's gaze went to Zidler, who was standing in the corner, staring at Eko with horror.

"Zidler, let's go outside," Bonnie said quietly. Zidler tore his gaze away from Eko and followed her out.

It was night, but most of the camp was up. Everyone returning, Kate, Eko… Desmond, Desmond with the news that more of their friends had been kidnapped, was enough to keep anyone sleepless.

"We – we need to save him." Zidler wasn't looking at her, but at a spot somewhere above her shoulder. Bonnie arched an eyebrow.

"We can't."

"We have to," he answered a bit childishly.

"We're no doctors, but Eko's strong, maybe he'll pull through it. But it would maybe help us if we knew what hurt him."

At that he looked up, and Bonnie continued, "What'd he say to you? When he was whispering you leant in. I know he said somethin'."

Zidler swallowed. "He said… 'You cannot…'"

Bonnie wrinkled her forehead. "You cannot what?"

"That's it," Zidler said quietly. "That's what he said. He passed out after that."

--

Charlie watched after Owen as she left to get water. Aaron whined in his arms.

"That's all right, little buddy. I'll go get you your bottle. If you're hungry that is, come on, give me a hint."

Aaron just continued to whine, and he wrinkled his face – the first sign that he was about to cry.

"All right, all right, no need to cry all over me," Charlie said gently, hurrying to get the bottle, if he could just remember where he'd left it…

"Are you looking for this, brother?" Desmond was holding the feeding bottle.

"Yes, thank you." Charlie smiled, taking it from him.

"Glad I could help," Desmond said, a little bitter.

Charlie looked up as Desmond started to leave. "We're not just gonna leave 'em out there, you know."

Desmond stopped and turned around. "I don't exactly see anyone of you going after them!" he shouted.

"Listen, mate. We're not abandoning them. It's not that we don't care, we do. We've have survived a bloody plane crash together!"

"I know," Desmond sighed, "I know. Sorry."

"It's all right," Charlie said in what he believed to be a comforting voice. "Just wait, I bet Bonnie's about to make a speech any sec –"

"Everyone!" Bonnie shouted, interrupting him. "Gather around! Yes, Neil I know you got the very important task of 'supervising' the traps but it can wait one minute!"

Charlie grinned, winked at Desmond. "What'd I say? Come on."

Bonnie stood by the dinner table. Her hair was pulled back in its usual ponytail. She hadn't changed her clothes, and they were sill stained from Eko's blood. Somehow she looked even more powerful that way.

When everyone was gathered around her, even little Ellie who stood alone (biting anyone who dared to try to hold her hand), Bonnie began to speak.

"As you've all very well have heard, even more of us have gotten kidnapped. Jack, Lori, Allen and Sean. Michael and Flor, two of us, betrayed them."

There were gasps from those who hadn't heard the last part and Bonnie's eyes almost flared in anger.

"Two of us. Two people who were on the plane. Who knew us, who knew them sold them out to the Others. And you think, after every damn thing we've been through together we would be able to trust each other." Bonnie shook her head.

"But let's not turn on our own people, okay? This just proves that we gotta be able to trust each other. It's not just learning how to fire a gun, how to set a trap and how we can survive a battle. It's also about learning to deal with all that comes with it, the emotions. What will you do if one of them holds a gun to your friend's head? Will you do as they say then? Will you sell us out too? If you get kidnapped, will you become one of them? Will you listen to their lies and forget that once upon a time they kidnapped a pregnant woman, scarred her until she remembered nothing, and then took her again? Obviously, the Others are bigger than us, got resources and who the hell knows, maybe they even got a nice set of houses somewhere on this island? And no matter how much we struggle, how much we _fight._ They are stronger than us."

Ellie made a small, sobbing noise and Kate tried to take her hand but she shoved it away.

"So we give up, we stay here and hope, hope that they won't take us, that they won't kill us. 'Cause there's nothing else we can do, right? _Wrong._ We got something they don't."

Kay frowned, confused. "What's that?"

"We've taken, what, three of them? That Karl guy, that Gale man and the other man in the hatch. And not one time, have any of the Others tried to free their own people. They have just left them to their fate, even when they planned to make the hatch man escape – it was two of us who did the work. We are different. We don't leave our people behind. We are not them! And, when the time is right, we'll get our people back. I promise you that. We can't be stronger than them, but we can be equal, so I suggest that anyone who can learns how to fight."

Ellie raised her hand.

"Anyone over five."

Ellie let her hand fall to her side.

Everyone was silent, no one made a move.

"So get to work then!" Bonnie shouted and they scattered.

--

It wasn't the best of traps, and Zidler was sure there was something wrong about it. The first clue was that it looked more like a penguin than those weird constructions Bernard has showed them.

"Ouch!" He rubbed the back of his head, pain spreading and he looked down at whatever had hit him… a mango. He turned around as fast as his hurt head would let him. "Who's there? You just hit me!"

"It's yooouuur suuuubcoooonscious," a drawled out voice whispered. "I aaam you basically, sooo listen to eeeevery wooord I'm saying… You aaaare the chosen one…"

"Margo!" Zidler whined. "Why did you throw a mango at me?"

Margo stepped out of her hiding place behind a tree. She rolled her eyes. "Because I'm hormonal."

"That was your excuse for taking all of my fish, for punching Frogurt, for throwing water at Libby, for –"

"It's a good excuse isn't it?" She smiled. She looked down at his trap. "Why are you building a penguin?"

"Because I like penguins, all right?" Zidler spat, turning away from her.

"Sorry," Margo said, all her laughter gone from her voice. "I was just wondering… Bonnie said… How are you?"

"Bonnie said 'how are you'?"

"No," Margo took a step forward, and her hand hovered just above Zidler's shoulder, like she was afraid to touch him but wanted to. "I said that."

"Eko's dying because of me," Zidler said quietly.

"No!" Margo said sharply, letting her hand fall to her side as she walked around to face him. "No. Some, polar bear, monster hurt him."

"I left him. I left him down there," he said in the same toneless voice, "I heard the sounds… I knew he was in trouble and all I did was to run away. So how is it not my fault?"

Margo shook her head. "Don't say that. Wasn't your fault. Eko's gonna be okay, okay?"

"He said something. He said something to me before he passed out and…" Zidler swallowed, looking away, trying not to cry in front of her. "He said I couldn't…" He looked at her again, his eyes full of tears. "I couldn't let…"

A scream sounded through the jungle. Margo blinked. "One of the traps!"

They darted through the trees until they arrived at a clearing, with one large tree in the middle, its branches stretching out, thick and wide above them.

In that tree, a man was hanging, his glasses barely just hanging on his nose.

He turned his light blue eyes to them, his smile somewhat askew since he was hanging upside-down.

"Hey," he said, his face flushing, "I'm Fred. Could you please help me down?"

----

Fred clumsily paid the cab driver, barely managing to get out his bags before he drove away.

The wharf was crowded, people shouted things from market stalls in a language he didn't understand. He swirled around as he was almost hit on by a green bus.

He looked up in awe at the big freighter. The _Kahana_. He took a better grip around his bags and crossed the narrow street.

"Hi," he said awkwardly to the woman with the manifest. "I'm Fred – Frederic Phelps."

The woman looked up, she had big brown eyes, then she looked down at the manifest again. A big grin spread on her face. And when she spoke it was with a thick Manchester accent, "Phelps, the botanist, yeah?"

Fred nodded shyly. "Yeah, uh, I guess."

"I'm Naomi, Naomi Dorrit." She frowned slightly and looked down. "Can't quite place your accent, says here that you're from the States."

"I – I lived in Australia for a long time."

She smiled again. "Then welcome aboard."

Fred nodded again, careful not to knock any of the crates and boxes over with his bags and stepped onboard the ship. He looked around the deck and wondered where he would go now.

"That one doesn't lie about his name."

Fred turned around and saw an Asian man, sitting on a pile of crates while eating an orange; he was clearly talking about him.

"S-sorry?"

"Don't waste your time on him," said a boy who was mopping the deck, Fred couldn't quite place his accent, but it sounded English-y. He brushed away a strand of black hair behind his ear and smiled. "Miles just likes to pretend he's special just because he can speak to de –"

The Asian man, Miles hit the boy over the head. "Go back to cleaning, Carrie"

"Cleaning," the boy muttered. "I've just arrived and they are already making me their slave."

"And you've already set a record in whining." A pretty black girl walked up to them. "Oh, hello," she said, smiling to Fred. "I'm Taylor. Croeso to the ship. I can help you to your berth." She took one of his bags with surprising ease.

"You learn her one word in Welsh and she uses it every time she can." The boy shook his head.

"Go back to mopping, Caradoc," Taylor said and Miles laughed.

----

"Look, Zidler," the girl said and held up something for the guy to see, "is this a satellite phone?"

"Yeah," the guy apparently called Zidler (he didn't remember anyone with the name Zidler from the manifest, not as first name anyway) took it from her, inspecting it. "It's broken, though."

"Guys, uh, could you let me down?" Fred pleaded, trying to look at them. But his vision was getting dizzy, and it was hard to fixate his eyes on something when he was rocking back and forth upside-down. "I don't – uh, think it's very good to hang like this."

"Do you know where Wendy is?" the girl asked sharply, squinting up at him.

"Who?"

"Then no."

"I know who Owen Chauncey is! Sort of," Fred said quickly, desperate to be let down. "And you must be the survivors, flight 815? I'm Frederic Phelps, I – I don't know why you have traps or who you think I am but I'm supposed to rescue you!"

"Good lie." The guy didn't even look up at him.

"Lie? No, I'm telling you the truth –"

"We got guns, you know," the girl said.

"And knives," the guy reminded her. "Sharp, sharp knives."

"And people are pretty pissed off –"

"– so they're gonna stand in line –"

"– to, well 'talk' to you."

"By 'talk' she means torture," the guy whispered. "So it would be kind of better for you if you just would tell the truth."

"I am!" Fred shouted. "I am telling the truth! I came here on a freighter, the _Kahana,_ to – to help you! And I jumped out of the helicopter, ended up in a tree, met this girl with one blue eye and one green eye – Owen Chauncey and she took the phone and gave me another phone and then I walked around in circles and I'm thirsty and I was afraid to sleep 'cause when I sleep I sleepwalk and… and…"

They were both looking at him with raised eyebrows and a similar 'yeah, right' expression on their faces.

"Margo, Zidler?" They both turned around, but Fred unfortunately couldn't clearly see who they were looking at.

"Frogurt! What are you doing here?" Zidler shouted a little too loud.

"What the – you caught one of them? And _Zidler, _you know very well that I am the supervisor. And is that a satellite phone?"

--

"Dom," Kate said gently when she came up to his side. She could hear clear enough not to scream anymore. "Dom."

Dom was just staring out in the horizon, completely still, not even blinking.

"Dominic Austen!"

He turned his head to her startled, and then immediately looked away. "Oh, um, Kate."

"Why are you staring out at the ocean?"

"Ocean?" Dom said, still staring at the waves. He frowned a little, like he hadn't known he was doing it.

"Are you all right?" Kate asked. "You've… What happened after the hatch?"

Dom blinked. "Nothing, uh, nothing. Just woke up alone."

Kate raised an eyebrow, smiling a little. "Without any clothes?"

"Not for the first or last time."

There was a bit of the old Dom she knew, and Kate let herself smile fully. "I'm just not used to seeing you gaze out at the sea, wistfully."

"I'm not staring 'wistfully'," Dom said, clearly offended. He looked down. "How're your legs?"

Kate looked down too, nodding. "Good."

"Wanna tell me what hurt you?" Dom asked seriously.

"I just woke up, like you, but with clothes on." Dom rolled his eyes at her words and Kate laughed.

"I'm feeling better now," she said, taking a step forward so that her feet were in the water. "I'm thinking of going for a swim."

She was too busy looking out at the waves to notice that Dom's smile was gone, and that he was staring at her with wide eyes.

"I… I…" He cleared his throat. "Maybe you should wait, you were hurt and…" He took a deep breath. "Just think we should stick around. Bonnie's speech was kind of terrifying, and with Eko dead…"

"Eko's not dead, Dom," Kate said carefully, seeing that weird look in his eyes again that he'd had when he was gazing out at the ocean, "and since when was taking a swim bad for the community?"

"Just…" Dom looked sad, honestly sad which only made Kate even more confused. "Just don't go for a swim today, okay?"

--

Kaylee immediately grabbed one of the rifles when Margo, Zidler, Neil and an unknown guy entered the camp.

She aimed the weapon at his head, stopping all of them in their tracks.

"I'm not going to shoot _you,_" she told Margo, Zidler and Neil and they all sighed with relief.

"He got stuck in one of the traps, he says he's from Naomi's freighter," Margo informed her.

"Naomi?" the unknown guy said eagerly, looking from Margo to Zidler through his glasses. "She was here? She was with me, she disappeared and –"

"Who's he?" Kay heard Libby said and more people were starting to gather around. She was still holding the rifle raised in the air.

"I'm getting Bonnie," Hurley said and hurried away.

"Who are you?" Kay asked the guy sternly.

"He said his name was Frederic Phelps," Margo piped.

"He had a satellite phone on him." Neil held it up for everyone to see. "Obviously he was the one to steal it days ago."

"Steal? No, no, Owen, that girl gave it to me!" Phelps yelled.

"Owen went to the caves to get water," Charlie said thoughtfully.

"What's going on here?"

Kay looked over her shoulder and saw Bonnie stalk towards them with big steps, a gun in her hand.

"It's one of the Others," Neil told her. "I caught him."

Margo and Zidler both looked aghast at him. "_We_ caught him."

"I built the trap –"

"But we –"

"Shut up!" Bonnie shouted. "Frederic Phelps? Really. Did you know what we once caught a guy who said his name was that? And he certainly didn't look anything like you. Lock him up, we gotta find out if he's telling the truth."

"The truth?" Phelps yelled. "Why wouldn't I be telling the truth? I have been looking for you, the survivors from the plane crash." He looked around at their faces. "Do – do you know someone named –"

"Say one more word of your lie and I will shoot you," Bonnie threatened, waving with the gun in front of his face. "Lock him up in the cage."

----

´"I want to see the captain!" Fred shouted again.

"The captain is _busy,_" the man outside the captain's stateroom sneered.

"I have to see him now!" Fred closed his fists, trying to stop himself from punching the guy in the face. He had to control his anger, because if he did hit the man, Omar, he would smash Fred into small pieces. "I don't bloody care if he's busy! I have to speak with him! Now! In this second, not later!"

"Leave now or –"

The door opened, and Captain Gault peered out from his cabin. "Let him in."

The man said warningly, "Captain –"

"He was disturbing my sleep, so let him in so he stops screaming."

Captain Gault's weathered face showed that he was used to being out on the sea, and since Fred first met him he'd had instant respect for him. And any other time he wouldn't dare to do this, to face him alone. But this wasn't any other time.

The Captain sat down behind his desk, charts spread out in a mess. "So what is your reason for screaming like a lunatic, Phelps?"

"Flight 815." Fred stared at him, but the Captain didn't even look surprised.

"What about it?"

"I was told, when I was recruited here that – that the place we were going to, that there was survivors from the plane there. And then, today, I find out that Oceanic 815 has been found in a trench under the sea, with all three hundred twenty-four passengers dead. So… explain that."

The Captain was silent for a moment, and then he sighed deeply. "You weren't lied to. The wreckage found, was fake. Do you understand what kind of resources and manpower go into pulling a feat of that magnitude? There were bodies down there, sure, but they weren't of the passengers of the real flight. So where would you get so many bodies? How would you cover that up? That is just one of the many reasons we want Benjamin Linus."

Fifteen minutes later, after a lot of yelling and embarrassment over said yelling. The Captain got tired of him and threw him out. The guard wasn't there anymore, but Taylor, holding a mop in one hand and a book in the other. She was reading it intently.

Fred honestly wondered if either Caradoc or Taylor actually ever did any work.

"I'm on a break," Taylor said, like she'd read his thoughts. She slammed the book shut. "You just ran out of the mess hall, looking all upset. What's going on?"

"I don't think you would understand."

She curled her lips up in a small smile. "I'm sixteen, Fred, not an idiot. If something's wrong you can tell me."

Fred supposed he could. "They found Flight 815."

"I've heard." She tilted her head to the side. "Doesn't explain why you screamed at everyone and everything."

"My friend…" He huffed. "It's… it's not that important, really."

Taylor took the book under her arm. She took a step forward, taking his hand. He was too surprised to pull away.

"It's ok –" She flinched away from him like she'd been burned, her eyes widening. She gasped and the book fell to the floor. "I have to go," she said without looking at him. She hurried down the corridor and out of sight.

Fred bent down to the ground and picked up the book she'd left behind, _Marianne Dreams._

----

The cage was made of wood, and Fred easily snapped one of the wooden bars with his hands.

"I think I could escape easily," he'd said.

"Yes, but I would shoot you," the blonde woman had said, leaving him in there. Knees drawn up to his chest and head bowed since the cage was very small.

Nobody had questioned him, yet, and he guessed they were discussing the best methods of torturing him. It made him slightly panicky, but it was kind of cool in a way, like in the comic books the hero would always endure horrid torture but stay loyal to his friends and always break out in the end.

But, he thought with some reluctance, he was telling the truth. And they didn't believe it. So there was nothing to protect or hide.

"You got some serious trust issues," Fred pointed out to the woman with the red legs guarding him. He'd heard a guy call her Kay, but he didn't remember her name being in the manifest either, just like Zidler and Margo. And he had a rising feeling that meant that these people were not the survivors from Flight 815.

Though their camp was practically built out of plane debris. And that he recognized that blonde woman as the famous Bonnie McQueen. So maybe… they were all aliens, yes that was the answer.

Aliens with gigantic trust issues.

Fred peered out on the beach through the bars, but it was a bit difficult to see, with being curled up like that and all.

"Hey!" Margo knelt down in front of the cage.

"Margo," Kay said in a warning tone.

"He's human, he needs water." Margo removed the cork from the bottle.

"Yes," Fred agreed, "I – I do."

"Here." She handed him the bottle. It was in a very awkward angle he drank from it.

"Thank you."

She smiled and stood up. He noticed that she held a hand over her belly, and he frowned.

"Are you – are you really from the freighter?" she asked carefully.

Fred was trying to nod. "Yeah."

"You must wonder what happened to Nao –"

"Margo!" Kay said sharply. "We aren't supposed to talk to…" Her voice trailed off, and he heard Margo gasp.

"What's – what's going on?" He tried to look out again, almost dropping his glasses in the process.

The rifle hit the sand and suddenly the guard, Kay was darting down the beach the fastest she could, Margo not too late after.

"Kate!" she heard them shout, and even though it was a bit difficult to see, he could see that there were people gathering at the edge of the water, some even in it. "KATE!"

Someone was drowning, he realized with horror. Someone was _drowning. _

Breaking out of the cage was easy, it was like breaking twigs. Nobody noticed his escape immediately, as they were all down by the sea.

But then Margo turned around, and she saw him running towards them. She looked scared, shocked but she didn't say one thing.

He saw a man (that somehow reminded him of Bruce Banner, before he turned green) carry a woman out of the water. Kay immediately ran up to them, helping him lay down the woman on the ground.

She wasn't breathing.

"The prisoner escaped!" someone shouted, but he ignored them as he made his way over to the lifeless woman's side.

Someone tried to pull him away, but he only had his eyes the woman, her face was freckled, her eyes closed and she looked so similar to the man who was desperately trying to breathe life back in her again.

"I – I can help!" he shouted. "You're doing it wrong – you – you're breathing air into her stomach – let me help!"

He pulled himself free and knelt down by her side. "I can help," he said to the man, "please, let me help her."

The man looked up; his green eyes stared into his. "Save her," he growled.

Fred nodded. He tilted her head up, hoping he had learned CPR correctly.

Further up in the now empty camp, Eko crawled out of his tent, mumbling, his eyes flickering but somehow not seeing a thing. He struggled up on his legs, stumbling into the jungle.

----

Not knowing what was going on was the worst part. The communication to and from the boat had been down for four days now, and they continued to say it was just a small malfunction every time Fred asked them.

"Let me tell you dear friend," Caradoc said with a grin, his mop forgotten by his side as he leaned against the railing. "I was down there, cleaning up some mess since somebody had apparently thought it was fun to drink coffee there when we were in that bloody storm, and all the wires are cut into two. It's not some malfunction or whatever they call it. It's sabotage."

Taylor snorted. "I really don't believe that."

"You can believe what you want," Caradoc responded, "but it's the best theory we got. Better than _aliens did it._"

"I thought it was a great theory," Fred mumbled, he wasn't paying too much attention now; since the conversation was going from interesting to Taylor-and-Caradoc banter (he would have to come up with a better name for that.)

Someone whistled, and Fred looked up.

"Aren't you supposed to be doing some work?" Lapidus shouted to Taylor and Caradoc.

They both rolled their eyes instantly; something they thought was very witty when they did that together.

Fred decided to leave them to their duties; he wouldn't want to face the wrath of Lapidus himself. Not that there was much of a wrath, but there was something about the man that terrified him. Caradoc said it was because Frank always was drunk.

He took a long detour around him, and found himself falling over someone.

"My cards…" the someone said in a broken voice. "Oh, no… my cards… no."

Fred, with the little dignity he had left, made it up to his feet. "Daniel, sorry, I didn't mean to fall for – I mean over you." He bent down and picked up the scattered cards, it was good that the wind wasn't blowing hard today. "Sorry."

"It's okay," Daniel said, almost in a whisper.

Fred remembered what Charlotte had told him earlier, ('be nice to Dan, I got a gun and I am strong enough to throw anyone in the water.'_)_

"What are you doing?" Fred asked as Daniel placed the cards in three neat stacks.

"Remembering," Daniel mumbled, "Charlotte... she was helping me but…" He frowned. "She… she had to go, Keamy…" He looked down.

"Remembering? With the cards?"

He nodded.

"I can help you," Fred offered, sitting down on one of the boxes. "I'll show you three cards, and you're gonna remember them, in order… or something, right?"

Daniel was silent for a moment, then he nodded again.

"All right."

At the best, Daniel could remember two – in the wrong order.

"You're probably wondering why I'm here," Daniel said sadly, "when I can barely remember who I am. I shouldn't remember physics, I shouldn't…"

"I know you're smart, genius and I... uhm, I know," Fred said, but he would be lying if he said he hadn't thought that.

"Why are you going to the island?" Daniel blurted out, and the complete change in tone caught Fred off guard.

"Uh… I… I was offered a part of the science team –"

"No, no… _why?_"

Fred sighed. "I'm looking for someone. I think she's there. Why are you?"

"Because," Daniel said, "I think it will fix me. And it's king, the king of hearts."

Fred smiled when he held up the card for Daniel to see, it was the right one.

----

"I should have listened to Dom," Kate groaned. She was lying on her back in the tent, Kaylee on her side.

"What do you mean?"

Kate closed her eyes, feeling a headache coming in. "He told me not to swim today."

"Did… did you go into the water just because he said you shouldn't?" Kay was used to the siblings impulses, but this time it wasn't an 'I dare you to eat that green thing.' Kate hadn't been breathing, if it hadn't been for Phelps…

"It's what siblings do, and he was acting strange, Kay. And what bad could a swim do?"

"You could _drown_,"Kay said, "which you almost did. And after you got hurt…" She shook her head. "How's your hearing?"

Dom was standing outside, just standing there with his hands in his pockets, water still dripping off his hair. He'd been there when Kate had woken up, but he hadn't said much. Everyone was busy with their own problems, the kidnappings, where to lock Fred in now, find Eko… but Margo had noticed, she had noticed that Dom was different now.

"How is she?" Margo asked.

Dom blinked, turning to her. "Who?"

Margo frowned. "Kate." As Dom's expression continued to be blank, she continued, "Your sister. Dom… are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, should…" And he walked away, just like that, continuing to mumble.

Maybe Charlie was right, maybe some parts of their brains had gone with the hatch.

Margo turned around and saw Zidler walk towards her fast, she smiled a little. "Hey…"

"Bonnie found a trail of blood leading into the jungle," Zidler said quickly. "She's no tracker, but a trail of blood should be easy to follow, right?" He laughed, almost hysterical. "But how could he even walk when he's bleeding out?"

"Zidler…"

"Bernard learned some things from Eko, before Eko was hurt of course so he's gonna tag along and –"

"You're not going, are you?" Margo asked him loudly, putting her hands on her hips.

Zidler blinked. "Um… yeah."

"Zidler!" Margo whined. And he sighed.

"Well, I have to! It's my responsibility!"

"How is it your responsibility?" she asked, taking a step closer to him.

"It was I – I was the one who left him there! If I had stayed –" Zidler looked down, blinking hard, "maybe… I have to, okay?"

Margo was silent for a moment, then she nodded. "Okay," she said quietly to his surprise. "Be careful, don't shoot yourself and – be careful."

"You be careful too."

Margo leaned in and kissed him softly. "Okay," she whispered when she pulled away.

Zidler smiled and she couldn't help but smile back. He touched her belly, and the words he said weren't meant for her, "Bye." He straightened his back, now speaking to her, "I'll come back."

--

Fred glared at anyone who dared to look his way. He was happy that the woman, Kate, was alive but he hadn't even gotten 'thank you', and right now they were deciding whether to lock him up or shoot him on the spot.

"I'm telling you the truth." He was getting tired of those words. This was really not how he had expected to find the survivors, there had been a lot more gratitude in his head, and the team had been with him. He hoped they would find him, but with that girl Owen stealing his phone it was more likely they would find her first.

"Why - why would I have saved her life if I wanted to – to 'kill' all of you? I'm telling you the truth, I promise, please!" he shouted, but it didn't seem that anybody listened.

He glared at the Chinese or Korean man pointing a gun at him, and he glared just as angry back. Fred flinched; maybe he was a samurai or a ninja or something.

"I wonder why he was tlaking about Owen. Maybe he killed her!" one of them shouted.

"We can't make a decision without Bonnie," he heard one of them say.

"Yes we can," a bald man answered, much louder. "Bonnie said she was no dictator, and we all have to make decisions. So I say we vote, do we believe him, or not? And if we don't, what will we do with him?"

----

Daniel was nice, weird but nice, and he didn't pry too much on the very weird things Fred did himself. So when Fred stole one of the broken computers Daniel said nothing. He even hid all of Fred's equipment whenever someone came into the berth they shared.

Fred had shared his thoughts with Daniel. Told him how he didn't believe there was anybody sabotaging the communication, but that for some reason, Captain Gault and all the others didn't want them to have any contact with the outside word.

Daniel barely understood, but he was okay with it.

"I think – yes, I got it!" Fred shouted.

"Were… weren't you a… botanist? Or an engineer…" came the lazy voice of Daniel Faraday.

"I'm brilliant!" Fred stared at the strange, radio-like thing he'd built.

"Botanist, brilliant, is it the same?" Daniel walked over the room to his side and sat awkwardly down beside him.

"I… I got contact with something…" Fred frowned, leaning closer to the computer, device, he wasn't sure what to call it really. "I'm not good with this, but this computer – thing-y is now connected with another one… I think," he added in a low voice at the end. "So, maybe… I think I could contact someone on the other end."

"How did you learn all of this?" Daniel asked slowly.

"I…" Fred blushed. "I wanted to do this kind of things, when I was a kid, I – I read a lot of comic books, and… I watched Star Trek."

"Ah, Star Trek."

Fred listened intently, there were some crackling coming from the device, but it was low, incoherent. "Wait, I think I heard something – Dhar… Dharma…"

Daniel suddenly stood up, walking across the room to get his bag, taking up something from it. He quickly rushed back, holding his journal. "Dharma… Dharma…"

He looked up from the pages, his eyes big. "We need Charlotte."

Charlotte's hair color matched her red face after she'd yelled at Fred for eight minutes for being an absolute idiot. Then she'd gently asked Daniel if Fred has brainwashed him. When Daniel said he hadn't, she agreed to help them.

"It's empty down there now, but almost all of the communications are down, don't know if it'll do any good," Charlotte said, leading them down the corridor. She rested a hand on the door, looking at Daniel. "Just be careful, all right? And if you get contact with the island, tell me. I don't like it when people use me like some kind of chess piece."

Fred and Daniel nodded and she opened the door. "Be quick."

Inside the radio room almost all of the cables were cut, but it wasn't that that Fred noticed first. It was the calendar hanging on the wall.

"They disappeared the twenty-second," he whispered. "The plane."

"The computer is not working." Daniel took the backpack off Fred's shoulder since he was just staring mindlessly at the date.

Fred came back to life and turned around, Daniel was placing the computer next to the other one on the table, (he called it computer or device, but it was a weirdly built transmitter, it would work the same, but it certainly looked like a big chunk of metal than anything else.)

"If we can connect these two…" Fred mumbled, but Daniel was already getting two wires, one step ahead of him. That was something that was fascinating about Daniel, when it came to talking, when it came to doing the normal things he was clueless. But as soon as it had to do with knowledge, physics, science he wasn't clear – but it was like an inbuilt mechanism inside of him that knew exactly what to do.

On the other computer's screen a blinking, green dot appeared.

"What did you do?" Fred asked, excited.

"I connected it with the closest source," Daniel explained, missing his point, "… it's the island, Fred, we are near. But too far away," he said sadly at the end.

"Is there someone on the other end?"

Daniel shrugged. "I don't know."

"Well, thank you, Dan." Fred pressed a button on the keyboard, typing the letter _H._

_e – l – l – o - ?_

Daniel gave him a weird look.

"You have to start somewhere," Fred defended himself. Nobody answered, and impatiently he typed in: _Is there someone there?_

_Who is this?_

"Someone answered!"

Fred typed: _Who is this?_

_I asked you first_

"What if…" Dan said, "what if it's someone here?"

"You said it was from the island."

"Yes… don't… don't tell…"

Fred nodded, typing: _My name is Frederic Phelps. Where are you?_

_I'm on an island._

Fred gasped. _You are on the island? Are you a survivor of flight 815? _

_Yes. Where are you?_

_I'm on a freighter._

The door flew open. "Someone's coming!" Charlotte hissed. "Come on!"

With one look at each other Daniel and Fred hurried to remove the evidence. Fred put the computer in his bag and they quickly left the room.

"Hey, Taylor!" they could hear Charlotte say too loud, close by but out of view.

"You know my name?"

"What are you doing here?"

Fred and Daniel began to walk quietly down the other end of the corridor.

"I'm _cleaning._"

Later, Fred was lying in his bed; his eyes open though it was night. He could hear Daniel snore lightly. But Fred was too occupied thinking of the little contact he'd had with the people on the island to sleep.

Suddenly there was a loud knock on the door; it opened just a second later.

"Captain wants y'all up on the deck! RIGHT NOW!" And whoever it had been left, leaving the door open.

Of course Daniel hadn't woken up.

Fred and he arrived quickly. The air was chilly and the wind was blowing hard, Fred looked around, he could see Charlotte, Lapidus, Naomi, the blonde scary girl, Milou, and a bunch of other people. But it wasn't everyone in the crew.

In front of them Captain Gault stood, glaring furiously at them.

"It has come under my knowledge," he shouted, "that someone has been trying to transmit a signal off this boat. Now, since all the communication equipment has been destroyed, I say that's quite an achievement."

Daniel had his mouth open in surprise, and Fred was so glad he was standing in the shadows so no one could see the look of horror on his face.

"As you all very well know, since people are damn gossips, we got a culprit on this boat. It's not that we don't want you to be able to contact your families, friends if you got 'em. But orders are orders and right now those orders are to not get involved unless I say so. I brought you all up here because you are the ones with enough, small intelligence to be able to do this kind of thing. And if I find out, that any of you, has been trying to contact the outside world again…"

----

"Eko's a good guy," Bernard said for the tenth time since they had started to trek through the jungle. "He's a priest, he is hard on himself. When we came here… he first took on a vow of silence."

"Why?" Bonnie asked him.

"He felt that would give him redemption, I guess."

"For what?" Zidler was trailing after them, trying hard to keep up.

"He… uh," Bernard almost looked embarrassed, "he killed two of_ them._"

Bonnie stared at him in bewilderment. "What kind of priest was he?"

"I don't know," Bernard answered her honestly. "But I know that wherever he is going, whatever he is doing – it's for a reason."

--

"We're near!" Kim shouted, somehow, it was only her who had been able to stay chirpy the whole way back to the camp, even though it was she who had been through the worst. "Can't wait to get a shower in the hatch, don't care if it's Frogurt's shift I'm having it!"

Fox managed a faint smile, but Andrea only grimaced, going a little faster over the sand.

Soon the camp came into view, and Kim started to wave her hands in the air, shouting things like 'we're back' and 'we're alive.'

Libby saw them first; she wrapped Kim into a tight hug, then Andrea. Hurley got to Fox first.

"Glad you're okay, dude."

"Jack, Allen, Lori they didn't –"

"We know," Libby said sadly, "Michael and Flor… it was a trap. Desmond came back and told us. "

Kim crossed her arms to stop anyone else form hugging her too, biting her lip. Andrea watched her, knew that talking about them being taken triggered memories she would rather forget.

"What more has happened?" Andrea asked as they walked the last bit back.

"A lot," Hurley said. "The hatch exploded, sky went all purple, Eko's missing and this guy, Frederic Phelps, says he's from the freighter."

"Freighter? Where is he?" She looked at Fox, and saw that his face had gone pale.

"Phelps?" Fox said before Hurley could answer her. "F-Frederic Phelps?"

"Yeah, right over there, we're thinking of taking him to the caves…" Hurley's voice trailed off, as all the three of them with renewed strength ran over to the group of people, and the guy with the gun pointed at his head.

The guy looked up when they reached him. And Andrea wanted to ask him so many things, but most of all she wanted to hurt him, if he really was one of the others she wanted to hurt him like they had hurt them.

"Are y-you Frederic Phelps?" Fox asked quickly.

Hadn't they already established that fact?

The guy nodded, looking frightened at the sight of them.

Kim was just staring at him; Andrea had no idea what she was thinking. But her gaze flickered nervously from Fox to him.

"He's n-not an Other."

"Of course he is!" Neil yelled.

"No," Fox said firmly, "he's n-not. He's telling the t-truth."

"Dude, you've been here for like… four seconds, how'd you know?" Hurley asked.

"I… he –"

"I believe him," Kim said quickly, startling all of them. "I think he's from the freighter. Look at him, he's no Other."

Andrea glared at her. "_Kimika _–"

"_Andrea_," Kim snapped back.

The guy's eyes widened. "Andrea?" he said carefully, "Andrea Widmore?"

"Yes," Andrea replied slowly.

"Your sister – Penelope, Penelope Widmore – she sent us!" Fred shouted. "Please, believe me."

Everyone was looking at Andrea, suddenly expecting her to make the decision.

She decided they should vote.

----

Fred had already come up with loads of excuses in case someone was already down there in the radio room, and he bet there was security there now. But he had to at least try to communicate with the people on the island again.

When he came into the corridor, he saw someone disappear around the corner on the other end. The door was opened to the radio room, and he couldn't help but to be curious on what was on the other side.

The radio room was even worse off than before, a machine crackled and a spark flew from it and he took a step back. Everything looked like it was beyond repair; it wasn't just the cutoff wires, all the equipment was smashed into pieces.

He needed to get out of there.

He turned around, stepping over the threshold. He tripped; fell on his face on the hard floor.

"Phelps?"

Fred struggled up on his feet. No, no it was the Captain. And the room – the room he'd just come out of – they were gonna think he was…

"I didn't think it was you," Captain Gault told him later as he closed the door to Fred's prison.

----

When Owen reached the top of the hill, she made a loud gasp. It felt like she had been walking endlessly hill up and hill down, avoiding the jungle and keeping close to the clearings. Thirsty, tired and hungry – and her body still ached from the whole caves situation.

But when she saw the big radio tower at the top of the hill, she knew there must be some reason for her suffering.

Yeah, she had gotten pretty crazy with hunger.

"Cool," she breathed, stumbling forward in the dark until she reached the door. It said _CAUTION._ And maybe she should keep out, but it was night now and she really didn't want to sleep on mud in the jungle.

She opened the door, stepping into the small bunker.

"_Iteration, one, six…_"

It was a transmission, a French speaking woman, sounding frantic and scared was speaking but Owen had no idea what she was saying. There was no way she would be able to sleep with that playing all the time.

"What is it sending?"

Owen froze, hearing a voice coming from the outside. She moved closer to the door, peering outside the small spring, but it was dark and she couldn't see clearly. She'd recognized that voice.

"Nothing, we should go –"

"Shouldn't we investigate – oh, it's one of those Other-secrecy things, right?" It was Wendy's voice. Owen's eyes widened. She remembered the vision, the 'please.'

She didn't hear the boy answer, so he must have nodded or shook his head.

"We should continue on, I think I know the way to the beach from here."

She heard their steps fade away, she was awfully curious to know what'd happened, but she had more important things to do.

Silently she sneaked out off the bunker, hurrying off into the direction of the jungle, away from the radio tower.

--

They said they believed him. But they weren't going to do anything else, find the rest of the team, ask him more questions until Bonnie came back.

So they left him alone by one of the bonfires, and he could hear them whisper about him, knowing they didn't trust him at all. But that they still desperately wanted to believe that he was going to rescue them.

"Do you want a blanket?" Fred looked up and saw Margo; she was smiling slightly, a kind expression on her face.

He didn't answer, but she dropped it on him anyway. He pulled it off his head, chuckling a little.

"I really do hope we are getting rescued," she said, a hand on her belly. "I hope we all do."

"I am telling the truth."

She smiled wider, but there was still some sadness in her eyes. "I do hope so. Since I'm pregnant and all."

She sat down beside him, staring at him. "You don't look so surprised."

"I just kind of sensed it." It had been kind of obvious, too. "Same thing when my best friend got pregnant too." He took a deep breath, this was it. "Is there… is there a survivor called Florence Bluth with you?"

Margo's smile fell, and she moved slightly away from him. "Why do you want to know that?"

"Because she's the main reason I came to this island in the first place."

--

**Author's Notes:** I am awesome at procrastinating. TV Tropes is a dangerous place no human being shall enter, or cat.

Thank you so much for your reviews, and music recommendations, thank you guys so much! You really have no idea how much your reviews mean to me, thank you!

So, yeah. That's not all you will see from the freighter, obviously. So, this chapter introduced **Caradoc Llywellyn** submitted by Key the Metal Idol, **Taylor Smith-Lee** submitted by DiorNicole, two awesome characters.

Namaste.


	37. Mourn

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,  
Assailed the monarch's high estate.  
(Ah, let us mourn!- for never morrow  
Shall dawn upon him desolate!)

_And round about his home the glory  
That blushed and bloomed,  
Is but a dim-remembered story  
Of the old time entombed.¨_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 30, Mourn**

--

"Watch that root over there." Alex grabbed her arm, but Lorraine shrugged her off.

"Don't touch me!" Lorraine spat. But she carefully avoided tripping over the root as she followed Alex.

"It's hard for me too. It's night and it's hard to see –"

"I_ know._"

Alex took a deep breath. Lorraine Hume seemed to believe that she could do anything. She didn't want any help from her. And maybe it wasn't because she was so determined to not be weak, maybe it was because she just didn't want any help from Alex – one of _them._

"So how are you thinking we are getting off this rock?" Lorraine asked after a while of silence. "Flying? Sorry, but as you luckily _see_ there are no wings on my back."

"I know where there is a canoe," Alex said.

"Convenient. Did you steal that from the poor bastards who might have been in a plane crash, shipwrecked before us?"

"No. I built it."

Lorraine turned silent. "Cool," she finally said.

"Hold on," Alex said, holding out an arm in front of Lorraine to stop her. She saw someone walking towards them though the tall grass. But it was too dark and she couldn't see. She knew some were out on patrol, and she always had the radio in case they didn't believe her. But they didn't have the time to explain, not now.

She took up the slingshot from her pocket, waiting.

"Ben?" Alex gasped in surprise.

A flashlight was turned on, and the light blinded her for a moment before she could see him.

Ben looked like he had expected to see them there.

Lorraine froze on her side, but Alex could see one of her hands tremble.

"Alex, Hume," Ben nodded to them.

"You murdered him."

Alex looked at Lorraine, her hands were closed in fists and she was white in the face. Alex turned to Ben, and saw that for once he actually looked genuinely surprised. But the moment was quick gone.

"I expect you to bring Miss Hume all the way back to her camp. Do you know how to get there?"

Alex nodded. "Yes."

"Good, I must ask for you to be quick."

"Quick?" Lorraine snarled, completely different from the tone earlier. "Just can't wait to get rid of me, huh?"

"Yes, Lorraine," Ben spat, "I want you to leave quickly because frankly, I'd like to keep some of my people breathing, if not alive. But if that is too much trouble for you why don't you just stay?"

Lorraine became silent again, but there was some color back on her cheeks.

"You should go now." Ben walked past them, without as much as a look at Alex.

"Once I'm there, at their camp, you know I won't come back?" Alex shouted after him.

He slowly turned around. And his blue eyes looked into hers.

Then he walked away into the trees.

----

The world was pale and gray outside the window. Lori shuddered, she did not see the bare walls, the ugly old painting with the red boat and the large, rickety bed, but she could feel how miserable everything was.

"She died here," the old man said behind her. His name was Joshua, he was eighty years old but on every picture in the house he looked so much younger. Not that Lori could see them, not that she could see how much he had aged in the week since his wife's death.

He walked past her, and she heard him smooth out the sheets on the bed with his hands. "She couldn't speak. She was so, so sick. But I understood – her eyes, they were always so beautiful, round, brown, like a deer's."

"I know," Lori simply said. She could feel it. The desperation hung in the air and if she let it take over she would almost choke on it. He, of course couldn't feel it.

"She could barely move her hand, but it trembled and she –"

"Could you be quiet?"

"Oh, yes, of course."

He was still, but his breathing was loud, raspy, uneven. Lori frowned deeply, taking careful steps towards the bed.

"She was scared," she told him. "She was very scared. She lied when she said she believed in afterlife, she didn't, not really. But when you were at her side… she felt safe."

She heard him gasp.

Lori knelt by the side of the bed. His wife had died there, slowly faded away.

"She wanted it to end. She wanted it to end so badly and…" Lori's breath caught in her throat. She could sense it, the fear, but also the gratefulness.

And he had put an end to her suffering.

"She loved you."

That was really all he needed to hear. She accepted her money, avoided the hug and left as soon as she could.

----

One second. _Tick tock._ Another second. _Tick tock._ One minute. _Tick tock._ Time was running out.

And with it Jim's life.

Jack thought about the man's mother, wondered where she was. If she even was alive. If she even cared about her son. But if she did, how would she feel knowing that right now Jack held her son's life in his hands?

Jack was so deep in his thoughts he didn't notice Lalah slowly walking around the table. But he did notice when she snatched the guns from him with surprising grace.

"Don't!" she barked when he tried to get them back. "You don't need them," she told him. "We're doing what you're saying anyway. His life is your weapon."

_Tick tock. _

--

"STOP IT! WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?"

Flor winced, covering her face with her hand but that didn't stop Ivan from punching her in the stomach. All air left her, her head fell to the side and her hands grabbed fists of dirt as she desperately tried to breathe.

He waited. He waited for her to see clearly again, to feel the rain on her skin, to hear Sean scream (STOP! DON'T I WILL KILL YOU! STOP!) words that were just a mess of don't, stop and threats.

He waited.

And when Flor took in a deep rush of air he hit her again.

"Stop," she pleaded, covering her arms with her hands, her face, she couldn't protect everything. She tried to stand up, stand up and flee. Her legs wouldn't bear. "Stop, stop, stop, stop!"

Somewhere in her mind Byron was laughing at her for being pathetic.

"I haven't done anything!" Flor cried, wiping away blood from her cheek and for daring to do so he punched her again. Hard. No mercy.

That was when she realized he was speaking, frustrated, desperate, angry words.

Someone named Jamie. Someone who was good. Someone who had been alive. But now wasn't. Dead. Dead. Dead.

"PLEASE!" Sean begged from somewhere far away. No, closely. He was there. He was watching. He didn't want her to get hurt.

"FLOR!" Sean yelled. "GET UP!"

"Stop!" Flor raised her hands and she stood up against the bars. Her back leaning onto them. "One month! Ben said one –"

"Ben's not here!" Ivan leered. "He can't protect you any longer. You'll die anyway," he spat. "Why not earlier? I'm helping you, you know. Gotta hurt knowing you're gonna end up dead either way, at least you don't have to wait now –" And he kicked her again, on the leg, hard enough to make her fall down on one knee. "Was Jamie's death fast? I don't know. Won't let me know. That, that's pain. Do you know what pain is Bluth? Think this is it? What about losing the only thing you've ever cared about?"

Flor glanced quickly Sean's way. He was still shouting. "I've already lost him."

She charged at Ivan. It was the surprise – not the strength that gave her the upper hand. She pushed him onto the ground, but she fell down also. It felt like the bruises were pounding. And as soon as she was back up on her feet again, so was he.

His fist connected with her jaw and she fell down again. The world was red. Blood, from her lip, nose, from biting her own tongue, running down her chin.

"No," she whispered, not to him, but to herself.

_Don't give up._

'_Least not without a fight. _

"FLOR!"

She stood up again, knew he was going to hit her now that she was up, back to breathing, back to feeling. So she ducked, hearing his fist hit nothing but air.

Get out. Get away. Get out.

She tried to run past him. The open cage door freedom. But he grabbed her arms. Slammed her up against the bars and she screamed.

"IVAN!"

It wasn't her. It wasn't Sean. It was the other man, Justin. Flor couldn't see him, but she turned her head slightly, and she guessed he was standing somewhere behind her outside of the cage.

"That's enough, Ivan! It will all be over in one month!"

"One. Month. Is. Not. Long. Enough!"

"Let her go. Ben will return soon."

"I don't care," Ivan was spitting out his words, and Flor looked at him, his eyes were big, crazy, his words twisted through his mouth. "I will kill her. Kill her. We're gonna do it anyway. Favor. Everyone a favor. Gonna –"

"Ivan! Someone's coming – Ivan!"

"Justin, leave."

Flor could hear him walk away, his steps fading, a door closing. Someone else was there now.

_Please, please, help me. _

"You said to me, Diane, you said Florence Bluth –" Ivan was speaking to the woman, desperate.

"I said it. I didn't mean it. Oh, brother. Shouldn't you have learned by now?" It was a woman's voice that had spoken, drawled out, slow, but still not soft but sharp. "I need you to step away from her, Ivan."

Ivan let her go. He took a step back and Flor collapse on the ground, panting, wiping blood again from her lips, from her eyes. Slowly, carefully she curled herself up in a ball, burying her head in her knees.

--

Claret was still like a statue until she couldn't hear the sound of his shoes clapping against the floor anymore. Then, she ran.

She ran down the corridor, opened the door and rushed down the stairs.

A woman stopped in her tracks, her small gray eyes getting big when she saw Claret hurry towards her.

"Ben," Claret panted, "where is Ben? Where is he? Tell me!" she demanded.

The woman shook her head, looking a little frightened. "You should be in your room."

Weapons. Guns. The woman didn't have any on her, but she could have. And Claret had seen, she knew. She knew they could hurt her. And she was so, so scared.

But for the moment, her fear didn't matter.

"Where is Ben?"

The woman stared at her for a long moment before she told her.

It was dark outside, but she could still see where she was walking. She tried not to think of all the horrible things that could be lurking out there in the dark and she hurried the fastest she could over the small path leading to the other building, Building 16.

She avoided going by the cages.

The door leading into the building was hidden by a large trees, leaves and branches hanging in front of it. She stepped inside, squinting, the brightness from the lamps such a change from outside.

She wasn't sure what was really in all the rooms. She guessed they were all storages, except for one room of course.

She wondered what could be hiding in the shadows.

She hurried up the stairs quickly. Her hands trembling as she opened the door to the second floor.

"Ben!" she called out, fear in her voice. She knew there had to be guards somewhere in Building 16, but she hadn't seen one.

In just that moment he turned around, one of the lights flickered and she cried out. Losing the bravery and anger she'd planned on lashing out.

"Claret, what are you doing here?" Ben asked, walking towards her quickly.

Claret, recovering, looked at him. His blue eyes looked concerned, and she liked to believe that is was for her. "I need answers," she said in one breath and he stopped. "I need answers now. I can't wait… I just saw someone… You have to tell me."

"This is not a good time."

"I don't care. I saw – I saw my father, Ben!"

Ben frowned. "Your father?"

"Yes."

He was silent for a long time, thinking. "All right. When I said this was not a good time, I meant it but you want answers so I will give them to you. But," he said sharply when he saw the scared smile spread on her face, "first I need you to do something for me."

He held out a file and Claret accepted it warily. She opened it, looking inside. "What is it that you want me to do?"

"What we spoke about earlier," Ben said calmly.

"But he…" Claret shook her head, looking up, "he's not ready yet! It's too early. We're not supposed to – he is not –"

"There are too many complications right now and my people will be more than happy to have one of the problems gone. I know this isn't quite the plan but right now, with these recent developments we have to do this."

"What recent developments?"

"Jack has… decided to take things in his own hands."

"But Ben –"

"Don't worry. Everything is being taken care of."

Claret nodded, but she knew he could see the doubt display in her face.

"Now, I need you to do this."

"Okay." Claret took a deep breath, walked past him to the door he had been standing outside. "How much do I tell him?"

"It doesn't matter," Ben replied.

She opened the door and closed it behind her. It was pitch dark inside the room and she flicked on the light switch.

"What the – who's there?" a gruff voice called out.

Wordlessly, she walked in a circle around the room until she was on the opposite end of the small table, facing the two doors next to each other and the Southerner sitting in one of the chairs, his hands tied back.

"Claret," Sawyer said, not a question, a statement that it was her before him and not a dream or hallucination. "Ah," he chuckled darkly, "so that makes it three musketeers. You, Madame Butterfly and Mickey."

Claret sat down in the chair, placing the file on the table.

"Still so damn scared though. Can see it, in those big blue eyes of yours." Sawyer smirked. "But baby, you know I'm all tied up."

"That's so you won't hurt me, James," Claret said.

Sawyer lost his Big Bad Wolf act for one moment, staring at her in bewilderment. "How do you know…?"

"I know a lot about you. Your name is James Ford, you were born 1968, to Mary Ford, you grew up in Jasper, Alabama." She was talking too quickly, her façade of confidence failing. "When you were eight your parents were conned out of all of their money by a man called Sawyer, so your father killed your mother and then himself. Year 1990, your life changed. You met Rosalie Alice Mills."

Sawyer's eyes became dark at the mention of her. But Claret continued on. And her voice was much stronger now, much more secure.

"You saved her. And you loved her. She was the only one you ever did truly care for in your entire life. In 1991, she gave birth to her child Eva, and she needed you more than ever but you still left. Because you couldn't stand the fact that now there was someone more important to her in her life than you. And you cheated, you conned, you were the rot in the society, but still you stayed in touch. Every second without Rosalie you spent destroying others lives just like the man you began to hunt, Sawyer, destroyed yours." Claret tilted her head to the side. "You became the man you hunted."

"So you got encyclopedic knowledge of me! Now what the hell –"

"Rosalie married Lalita Renneé Burton. And you conned a woman named Cassidy, sending yourself into prison in which you only served one year. You went to Australia, telling Rosalie and her family it was to see them, but really it was because you thought you had found the real Mr. Sawyer –"

"What the hell is the point of this?" Sawyer roared.

"The point is," Claret said, slamming the file shut, "is that we know you. I know you now. I know you shot Frank Duckett in cold blood. I know that now, the long double-life you lived, being a conman, being a friend to Rosalie has ended. The only good thing about you is gone. The only thing you ever cared about is dead. And do you know what that makes you, James? That makes you a bad person. A person who is not worthy of staying here on this island."

"Well someone has grown a spine," Sawyer snarled. But she could see the confusion, fear, sadness hiding behind his stoic face. "And believe me, Shaky; if I could I would gladly leave this rock."

"Good," Claret said, "because that's exactly what they want you to do."

"What?"

"As I said they don't want you here. You're a problem, James. You're a stain, and they want to wipe you away."

"You can leave this place? 'Cause in that case I don't understand why you're still here. And if you really expect me to believe you –"

"They don't. They've lied." Claret nodded at the two doors behind him. "If you open the other door you'll find nothing but an empty room. Eva isn't there."

Sawyer opened his mouth but Claret cut in, "They have her. She's just not in there. And that pacemaker isn't there. The only thing they installed in you was doubt. It was a game, a wonderful plan that now will never be executed. Because right now, they just want to get rid of you."

"Why not just fire a bullet through my skull?"

"Because that would be murder. There is nothing left for you here. Rosalie's gone."

"Eva, Lalita –"

"You don't have to pretend you care about them."

And the look Sawyer gave her was enough to send chills up her spine. It was a look that would have made her shiver, tremble with fear and whimper for the cruelty to stop. It would have, if she hadn't left the scared Claret behind when she closed that door. Like she took off her coat, and she would put it on later, but not now.

So now she just stared, her back straight, her words and eyes cold.

But _scared_ as he said they still were.

"How did it go?" Ben asked, much later when she stepped back out in the corridor.

"He…" Claret looked down, and she couldn't help the tears that began to fall. She could see through the blur how Ben raised a hand; she would have thought it was to comfort her, if it weren't for the fact that Ben didn't do that.

"In the morning we will talk. You should get some sleep now."

--

"We're here," Alex said, relieved when she saw through the wild forest of leaves glints of the ocean. She leaped over a root. "The canoe is here… help me." She uncovered the branches she'd put over it and Lori, warily helped her too.

"Take a hold there," Alex told her. And they began to drag the canoe out from the trees.

"Is…" Lori said quietly.

"It's there, the island is just over the water."

Lori turned her head, like she could see the amazingly blue waves and the other island, big, mysterious and right there.

The two oars were in there, good.

"So you guys just got canoes lying around, hidden in the jungle? How'd you get it anyway?"

"I built it." Alex smiled a little, thinking about how Karl and she had made it together. There was pain in that thought. They could have had so much. But everything just stood in their way.

"Come on, we need to get it in the water…" Her voice trailed off and she straightened her back, looking at the jungle.

"What is it?" Lori asked, then she gasped.

"Diane," Alex said, staring at the gun pointing at them. Diane was holding it in one hand, her face expressionless.

"Alex," she said gravely.

"Ben said – Ben said he would let us leave –"

"Yes, Alex, I know. I will let you go. But first, I need you to contact Jack and say you are okay." Diane threw a walkie, but it wasn't Alex who caught it, it was Lori.

"Seriously," Lori snorted, "you are just unbelievable." But she still put it to her mouth. "Jack! Jack are you there?"

At the other side of the island, the walkie-talkie crackled and Jack took it quickly out of Addie's hands. "Lori?"

Lori smiled. "Jackie, good to hear your voice."

"Are you safe? Are you in safety?"

Lori nodded. "Yeah, yeah I am. We're just about to leave. We got a canoe and stuff, this girl even built it herself." her voice shivered, and Alex saw that she was trembling, but she was trying to keep her voice steady.

For Jack.

"Lori, leave and don't come back. You can't come back for me, do you promise me that?" Jack nodded to Addie, who took the radio from him and held it up so he could start stitch Jim up and still talk to her at the same time.

Lori laughed hoarsely. "Since when did I start following your orders?"

Jack smiled. "Please, promise me."

"No can do."

Jack shook his head, his smile disappearing. "Damn it, Lori! Don't come back!"

"Do you really mean that? Or are you still trying to play the hero? You don't need to be the hero."

"Leave. Go back to the camp. Don't come back."

"I won't leave –"

"I love you."

Lori almost dropped the walkie, and she squeaked, "What?"

"Don't come back. I love you."

Lori stood there, gaping. "I… I… I will so not fall for that trick, you moron!"

"I need that back now." Lori gave the walkie back to Alex who threw it to Diane who caught it with one hand.

Without another word, Alex and Lori left the island.

And Diane walked back into the jungle.

----

"Who the hell are these people?"

Lori chuckled under her breath when she heard the angry man's words. As all the others, he was told he was one of the many physics Mr. Peterson had hired to speak with his daughter.

Who of course was dead.

"Can't believe this," he muttered and sat down in the chair next to Lori. She frowned; it was something about him – something different.

"He just wants to be sure," she said in a low tone.

"He wants to be able to pick and choose the conversation he likes best, and it doesn't work that way."

"Yet you're still here," Lori pointed out.

"We get paid, a lot."

She snorted and she could feel his gaze on her.

"Yes, because of course you do this by your kindness only, and getting paid is a plus in the margin."

"A huge plus." Lori smirked. "At least I'm not lying."

"Never said you were," he mumbled. Louder he said, "The blindness must be good for business."

"Smooth, since I really am blind." She expected a shocked silence, maybe an awkward apology.

"I know," he replied instead.

"Mr. Straume," called a voice from the room here all the other "psychics" had entered.

"Wish me good luck," the man at her side said as he walked away into the room.

Lori couldn't believe this. She'd been there for almost over an hour! She began to mutter to herself just to freak out people sitting close by.

After just ten minutes Straume returned. Lori knew it. The… _difference_ was back in the air again. She expected disappointment, swearwords, for him to throw a tantrum just like everybody else who had gone in because they hadn't gotten paid because the man Peterson wasn't happy with their answer. That was mostly the reason she'd stayed, the challenge.

But instead she heard him thank someone for the money.

A woman came and told her she wasn't needed anymore, and the ones left in the waiting room started to get angry. She felt him leave the room and hurried after, almost tripping over the stairs since she didn't concentrate.

"What did you do?" Lori yelled and she heard him stop. She caught up to his side.

"Told the truth," Straume replied, and she could hear the glee in his voice. "Told him that his dead, but kind of hot, daughter hated his guts."

Lori, instead of getting furious over having wasted hours of her life for nothing, laughed.

----

Jack was thrown into his prison and he stumbled on his feet, gripping the table as the door was closed behind him. He took a moment to catch his breath before he stood up, his legs bearing for just a second before he collapsed on the dirty floor.

_Lori is safe. Lori is safe. Lori is safe. Jim is saved. Lori is safe. _

He heard the door open on the other side of the glass. He got up to his feet and saw Felicity stand there. Her arms were crossed over her scrubs, her bright green eyes piercing into his.

"Thank you," Felicity whispered.

Jack walked up to the glass, facing her. "I didn't do it for you."

She was silent for a while, and he didn't know what she wanted him to say.

In the end, he just couldn't stand her staring at him like that. So he said loudly, "When am I going to do the surgery on him?"

"What?" Felicity's eyes were big, and she looked surprised.

"Ben. When am I going to do the surgery? I saw the x-rays, they're his, right?"

"I… I just wanted to thank you." She spun on her heel and left the room quickly.

--

Lalah hadn't had the time to change her clothes after all the events from the night. There had been people to tell, Jack to get back to his cell, Jim to be taken care of, dealing with all the questions and Ben suddenly telling her Claret was now in charge of Sawyer.

It was a relief when she was back in the room. But there was a moment of confusion when she wondered why the room was dark, why there was no one there waiting for her.

When work was over, when she closed the door behind her and with it all the new things she'd experienced, all the pain she left behind her too. And she expected, stupidly expected, that there would be someone there to help her with it.

But it was getting harder and harder. She couldn't let it go as easily anymore, and now, it was almost impossible.

She couldn't sleep. And she didn't have the time.

She left her room. Avoiding any contact with anyone on the way down to the deepest floor, underground. Where Shephard, crazy Shephard who'd managed to let one of his friends go (a pity, since Lalah had been curious on what the experiments would show, but alas, she wasn't that important), and risked Jim's life in the process.

No one was in the observation room. And Lalah sat down in the chair, taking a moment to look at the monitors. The one that should be showing the cages was black. She immediately pressed a button next to the intercom.

"Korosov, you there?" she said, hoping Addie had the radio on.

"_Korosov here._"

"Could you check out Bluth and O'Donnell? And the surveillance camera there isn't functioning."

"_I'm on it_, _Lee._"

Lalah pressed the button, turning the connection off. Instead, she pressed another one and turned a knob beside it.

"Lee here. Is there someone there?"

Lalah waited patiently, and an answer came after a while.

"_Con_ –" static interrupted the speech, "– _tion was a bit off but it should be fixed now. Vince here. Is there a problem at the Hydra? I've already checked in with Ben._"

"No problem here. Vincent, I had to leave quickly earlier on –"

"_You don't have to say goodbye, darling. I understood._"

Lalah smiled, because she knew Vincent was absolutely genuine. "Right. Can you ask Niles if he got… somethin' for me?"

"_You mean – a message?_"

"Yeah."

"_Hold on, I think I saw him right outside._ _Can you wait?_"

"Yeah, sure."

Lalah waited, she shifter her position in the chair. She pulled up her legs to her chest and leaned back.

"_Lalah, love, you there?_"

"Yes!" Her answer was too hectic, too out of control.

"_He said he didn't have any. Sorry_."

"He said that?"

"_Wrote on his little notepad. Something along the lines of: 'A message loses its meaning when it is told from someone else's lips.' Don't know what to make of that_."

"I know," Lalah whispered to herself. Louder, to Vincent she said, "Thanks."

"Night, Lalah."

She didn't answer and ended the connection between the two islands, sighing deeply.

She needed something. She just didn't know…

She jumped up on her feet. It would soon be morning, another day of work. And she didn't want to sleep. Why not just get started right away?

--

Flor woke up when the first rays of sunlight hit her face. And when she did, she had no idea how she could even have fallen asleep. She cried out in pain, her whole body felt like it was on fire.

And then, when she pulled herself up in a sitting position, it stopped. The hot, burning magma inside of her faded and all that was left was ache.

"Are you okay? Flor? How –" the voice was desperate, she didn't recognize it. She kept her eyes closed. If she opened them Ivan would be there again. He would hit her. They would kill her.

"That's it," she heard from somewhere far away. And maybe she wasn't awake; she hurt too much to be. And still she somehow couldn't feel.

She blinked; completely startled she looked into Sean's eyes. There was something wrong about him being there. He… the cage…

Flor struggled up on her feet. Her bruises ached painfully. "How – how did you get out?"

"I climbed," Sean told her, and he rushed to the lock. "Ana-Lucia got out of hers earlier, too. And the camera is still down, I think. I can…" He picked up a rock from the ground.

"You – you think –stop!" she cried when he started banging the stone against the lock. "Stop it, please!"

The sound was too loud. They were out in the open. Anybody could see him, and he would be punished. Hits, bruising kicks, blood, red everywhere and blue from the rain. Not him. Not him.

"There's no time. We have to get you out of here. We have to go back." His words were rushed, blending into each other, a mess. Just like her head was a mess of memories, of pain, of fear.

"No!" Flor reached through the bars and grabbed his wrist, but it didn't stop him. She tried to grasp a hold, but she was too weak. Always too weak. Pathetic. "No! Please! There's no – we – we're on another island, Sean, please don't."

"I don't care. Anything – anything for time." It wasn't like him. Words incoherent. Eyes burning like he was having a fever. Not him.

Flor hadn't been realizing she had been crying until this point. But the tears were streaming down her face, salt and blood and dirt running down in her mouth. "We don't have any," she whispered, useless words, for him no meaning, for her it meant everything. One month. One month left. But with Ivan, it could just as well be an hour.

"No – stop – no –" And he did.

Flor whirled around when she heard the steps, trying to gather herself enough to figure out what to do. But it wasn't her who needed to hide.

Sean was back into his cage, not looking the least tired from the climbing. And she sat down, since her legs were shivering too much.

A woman with short, blonde hair came walking into the area. She held a gun in her hand. She looked harsh, like the kind of woman who wouldn't take any kind of misbehavior and she looked up at the camera. She didn't throw a glance Sean or Flor's way. She picked up her walkie but Flor couldn't hear what she was saying.

Blue and red. Three drops of blood in the snow. One month.

--

Red and blue, dripping down always down, dirty gray roof, white covering everything, bodies spread out and worms crawling. Eye for an eye. Mindless words, oceans rushing in. Ana. Ana. Scream, not hers. Ana didn't scream that way. A young boy. She could see them. But she couldn't. Her eyes were gone. Tears, tears, tears. Rest in peace. They died here. They died there. One after one, Ana-Lucia, Jack –

And Lori woke up to the smell of the sea and the sound of someone – Alex – walking around. She heard the sounds of her putting out a fire.

"Why – oh," she groaned, sitting up.

"I let you sleep for a while."

"Uh-uh." Alex nudged something against her hand and Lori opened her palm.

"You must be hungry; it's a piece of a mango."

"I knew that."

Lori carefully took a bite. It tasted absolutely wonderful.

"We should get moving."

"Hold your horses." Lori stood up. "Do you even know the way to our camp?"

"I'll find the way," Alex replied, sounding way too cheerful for so early in the morning.

"Sure you will."

Lori still followed after the girl.

----

"So you like, look into their minds and hear what people think before they die?"

"I'm not a TV," Miles said, "I don't 'hear', more like…"

Lori nodded as she understood. "Just knowing."

"Yeah."

Lori took a sip of the cheap alcohol. She was shocked that she wasn't more surprised, that she didn't think he was lying, that she just simply knew that he was like her. Not one of those scams and oversensitive people who actually believed themselves when they read tarot cards and lit a candle for a ritual. He seemed to be the real thing.

And, as Lori had noticed under the short time of their conversation, he was a jerk.

But that was all right, since nice people were rarer than clairvoyant psychics, Lori should know.

"When did it start?"

"What?"

She waved with her hand. "Your psychic powers of doom." Lori took another sip, ugh, it was disgusting.

"I wouldn't exactly call them powers, they're my income and they have always… been there."

"So when you were… what? Eight? You could chat to dead people?"

"Couldn't you?"

"Nope." She took another sip, huh; it was funny how better it tasted with each swallow. "No feelings of death, no weird vision-like things, no dead thoughts. Not even when I went to the cemetery. Started when I was seventeen. Got up one day, walked down the street on my way to school and bang! Dead person lying in an alley. Kind of freaky."

"Okay." She could hear the mockery in his tone. "So basically, what you're telling me is that I'm far more powerful."

"I thought you said it wasn't a power."

Suddenly her cell rang, Lori didn't bother listen to what he was saying as she answered it. "Hume here."

"_It's Penny._"

----

"Will you leave?" Lalah said to the two guards standing outside the cell. There had been two more, outside the only door leading into the corridor of the room. Double security, double the cameras.

Didn't matter, though. They all knew that. Nothing could keep something as wild as her in.

"Addie said –"

"Scram or I'll call Ben myself."

The two guards exchanged a look and left. The door slamming shut behind them, a lock clicking into place.

They all thought it was useless, the extra security.

Lalah opened the door with one hand, balancing the tray with food on the other.

Should just put a bullet though the prisoner's head and be done with it they said.

She closed the door behind her, and put the tray down on a small table. The room was small, a passage. There was another door on the opposite wall, bars instead of wood and she could see right in.

"Liking your new home?" she said to the woman inside.

The woman stood up on her feet, her black hair cascading in front of her face in a way Lalah wasn't used to see her. They had pulled out the woman's ponytail; she wasn't allowed to have anything that could be used as a weapon. There was nothing inside but her, not a chair, not a blanket.

Her new clothes were thin, and Lalah could easily see the horrid scar running up her back.

"Brought you some food, you know the drill. Sit down in the corner and I'll give it to you, yeah?"

The woman did nothing but to turn around. She tilted her head to the side, just a little, her captivating blue eyes looking into her own brown. Her skin was pale, too pale against the dark eyebrows and the red lips.

Lalah raised an eyebrow. "It's good food, Janna. Unless you aren't hungry. I sure ain't. Have had a terrible day."

Janna still didn't move, but she blinked.

"Haven't slept." Lalah laughed hoarsely. "Still have bloodstains on my clothes." She swallowed. "I'm sure you will be glad to know another one of us almost died today."

A small furrow appeared between Janna's brows, like she was saying that she wasn't happy at all. But you could never know with her. She always changed, always new, always intriguing.

"Please sit down in the corner."

Janna nodded slowly. Pulling her hair back she sat down.

Lalah took out the keys out of her pocket that she'd taken from one of the guards. She wasn't supposed to go inside Janna's cell; she was supposed to bring the food through the bars.

Janna knew that.

She didn't make a noise as Lalah put down the tray in front of her, and after a moment of hesitation – Lalah sat down too, her legs crossed.

"Remember when I told you of the new ones?"

Janna nodded, taking the bottle with water and drinking.

"One of them managed to flee today, but we're not going after her."

The corner of her lip twitched, all Janna did for a smile.

"I don't know anymore. Ben is just… he doesn't tell us anything. He says he got a plan but what the grand deal is about we – I have no idea. The point of bringing Ford and O'Donnell here is beyond me."

Janna still didn't say anything.

"And I haven't heard from her. And now I'm stuck here – on this damn island! And you're not talkin', not saying a friggin' word, why?"

"Because," Janna said slowly, "you are the one who needs to tell, right?"

And Lalah did.

--

Lori hadn't been able to walk much. She'd fallen asleep again embarrassedly enough, and she could feel the irritation practically radiating from Alex as they hiked through the jungle, she had to take breaks about every fifteen minutes.

"It's almost night. We can set camp here."

Lori could have cheered with happiness. But she was saving her strength. She knew they were close to the camp. She flopped down on the ground and leaned against a tree and Alex began to work on the fire.

"I'm surprised," Alex said after a while of silence.

"Of what?"

"That you haven't tried to go back, escape from me to get your friend, Jack. Not that – not that I want you to do that. You said you wouldn't listen to him."

"I always disagree with him. That's how we roll." Lori smiled a little. "But I'm never, ever going back there."

"Why?"

"Do you know what your father did to me?"

She heard Alex put down her canteen. "No," she said quietly.

"They kept me locked up inside this room, cold, I suppose it was dark too. So, the first day, I'm in there all by myself." She had been angry at first, screaming, threatening to nothing since there was no one listening. But then, as the hours passed and she had no idea what hour it was or why no one visited her, said something the fear had raised and all she had been able to do was to curl up – stay silent and wait.

"Then," she continued, "I think it was night. The door opened, I didn't… no one spoke. But I knew there was someone there, and someone else too. But they were not the same. And the door closed, and one of them was gone, but there was still someone there." She swallowed, blinked. "It was Ana, Ana-Lucia."

"I thought she die –" Alex stopped herself and went silent.

"Do you know what I can do?" Lori said silently, standing up just as quietly.

"They – they don't, my dad doesn't –"

"They kept me locked inside that room," Lori carefully, soundlessly took a step forward, "with the dead body of my friend. Hours later, they brought two more corpses. Took one, they took away Ana. Hours passed after that. The smell – was horrible. And then they brought in another one. A child."

Lori took one step forward. Listening, determined where she was. The leaves rustled from the trees, but the ground was gritty sand. She could hear the sea, the waves.

"The child, it was a little boy, died screaming." She bent to the ground, silently. She knew Alex wouldn't hear her. Knew that she wouldn't turn around. "I can _feel_ death."

And she picked up the log and swung it at her head.

At least, she thought as she hurried away over the sand, she hadn't said something as cheesy as: _'I see dead people.'_

----

Lori was sitting, still as a statue in her couch. Her hair was much shorter now, barely reaching down to her ears. On the table was a half empty glass, the wine that Stephen had left last night, and a magazine Cassie had left there. But Lori couldn't see the bright, pink title or the pictures on the cover. She just knew it was there.

Just as perfectly still she listened to the messages from the answering machine. Still no bloody sign of her brother. Some guy who thought they'd been more than a one-night stand. From Miles Straume, wondering when they were going to work together again.

Suddenly she jumped up, grabbed the keys and stumbled into her shoes as she ran out of her apartment.

It was raining outside. Her hair got plastered against her cheek; drops ran down her face like tears. Someone, Desmond had once told her that the rain was blue. And that blood was red. She faintly remembered that. She remembered it was beautiful.

Red and blue.

Red from his death. Blue from her tears.

----

Wendy had started to recognize the area they were in. And she knew they were close to camp. But right now it was night, and she and Karl were looking for place to make shelter.

"So, that radio tower," Wendy said at the exact same time as Karl said, "So, your people."

"Can't talk about it," Karl said, looking sheepishly at her.

"Then I can't talk about it either." Wendy was holding the torch, and picked up her pace so she was walking in front of him instead. She knew Karl wasn't going to like it, but she was going to return there. If that thing was still working, then maybe they could send out a transmission.

Maybe that was the place that French message had been sent out from. And if that was the case…

But either way, they needed hope.

"Stop!" Karl shouted suddenly.

"No, we need to find shelter –"

"Wendy, I mean it! Stop!" Karl didn't sound scared or angry, he sounded terrified.

Wendy whirled around and the torch's light flickered. "What is it?"

Karl was turning around, looking up. He put one finger to his lips. The universal sign of shut up.

Then she heard it.

"Is that a bug or –" A loud, screeching metallic clang interrupted her.

"RUN!" Karl screamed, grabbing her arm and dragging her with him. She dropped the torch on the ground, thinking for one split second about a forest fire, then all that was on her mind was to flee.

Wendy screamed as a tree was pulled up by its roots behind her. Dirt and grass got thrown in the air as they leaped over a rock.

Karl's hand was sweaty, slipping out of her grip and Wendy tried her hardest to hold on. Whatever it was (_monster, the monster_) pulled up another tree and it fell down in front of them.

Wendy just ran blindly, not thinking of which direction as she stumbled in between the trees. A branch scratched up her arm and _where the hell was her gun?_

She froze when she heard four shots ring out from somewhere far behind her. "Karl!" she gasped. She swung around but he was nowhere in sight. The strange noises were gone and all she could see were trees, trees and even more trees. "KARL!"

She found him in the morning.

The sun was shining so brightly, hurting her eyes as she stepped out from the shadows under the trees. She slipped over the stones, her whole body shaking and with the taste of blood still in her mouth. She had bitten her tongue when she'd fled.

The stones were smudged red. And the water poured down from the waterfall beautifully, an idyllic scene. But the blood was wrong, the blood leading down to behind the rock, half in the water, was wrong in every way.

"No, no, oh no, God, no."

Karl was broken.

"No, Karl, no."

She turned his face. And she had to bite her lip not to scream. His left eye – his left eye was nothing but a bloody mess. And his legs, they – they looked crushed. His arms, they were twisted above him and it wasn't right. Wrong, it was all wrong.

"No," she sobbed. "NO!"

And then she saw that he was still breathing.

She pulled him up in her arms. "I'm going to save you." She was going to bring him back. "You're going to be all right." His blood was so red. "No, no, don't go." She went, carrying him. "You're gonna be okay, gonna be all right." The water was so blue.

"Please."

--

**Author's Notes: **Had an English test from 8 am to 11 am, not used to that. But in that way I could study while writing this story and watching television without Swedish text. That was the upside. The point of that is that I love writing this story. So thank you guys for reading it, reviewing and for giving me awesome characters.

So, to recap the chapter: Lori's awesome and Ben likes to manipulate people.

I'm working on a little special project involving this, won't say much about it, but I think it's gonna be lovely.

Namaste.


	38. After So Many Days

_Type of the antique Rome! Rich reliquary  
Of lofty contemplation left to Time  
By buried centuries of pomp and power!  
At length- at length- after so many days  
Of weary pilgrimage and burning thirst,_(Thirst for the springs of lore that in thee lie,)  
I kneel, an altered and an humble man,  
Amid thy shadows, and so drink within  
My very soul thy grandeur, gloom, and glory!

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 31, After So Many Days**

--

"I don't think she understands what solitary confinement means," Kaylee said to Locke who just smiled.

"Oh, she does," he answered, watching Margo as she walked down the sand over to the place where Fred was sitting.

"I got you some food, fish, weird yellow things." Margo smiled brightly, giving him the plate.

"Thanks." Fred didn't smile, just looked sadly at the food when he took it. Margo sat down beside him. The solitary tree giving them shadow from the sun. Further down the beach, some had stopped to watch them.

"You just ran away last night," Fred said, blushing as he broke the silence. "After I mentioned Florence Bluth."

"I was nauseous. And… I don't trust you completely. Can you really blame me?"

Fred looked out at the sea. The waves were amazingly blue. He knew that they were. He'd seen that when he was on the freighter. At the horizon, the sun had just gone up. He'd admired the island's beauty from above. But what did it really matter now?

And everyone distrusted him. They all stared at the place under the tree he was now… living in? he didn't know, scared, blaming.

"What happened to you?" he asked her, honesty in his voice. He really wanted to know.

"I'll tell you if you tell me what really happened to you." Since Fred hadn't touched the food. Margo took some of the strange yellow fruit.

"I'll sound cliché but it's a really, _really_ long story. I have absolutely no idea how to start."

"Why don't you start with why you're looking for Florence Bluth?"

And Fred looked at her now. Her light brown hair was pulled back in a loose ponytail with a ridiculous red beret over it, her gray eyes flickering nervously as he stared at her, her nose looked like it had been broken more than once, and her freckles were faint in the shadow.

She looked normal.

"I can't," he whispered.

--

Bonnie knelt down beside the creek. She frowned; blood was smudged on the stones. Eko must have taken a break to drink.

Further down the creek, Bernard was filling his canteen with water, speaking with Zidler. Bonnie was unconsciously listening, still deep in her thoughts about Eko.

"Want some?" Bernard asked.

Zidler shook his head. "I'm not thirsty."

Bernard sighed and stood up. "Son, just drink."

"No."

It was like a conversation between a parent and his four year old child, Bonnie thought as she stood up herself.

"It's not your fault Zidler –"

"I don't understand what that has anything to do with water," Zidler snapped in a very uncharacteristic way. He began to walk over the stones Bonnie's way, and Bernard followed him.

"He crossed the creek," Bonnie told them, but none of them were listening.

"You are blaming yourself," Bernard said. Zidler snorted.

"Can we please just hurry up?" Zidler had his eyes on the blood.

"Of course," Bonnie replied, turning to face him. "But first you are going to tell me the truth."

Bernard became very silent, and Zidler's eyes widened slightly in surprise. "Uh… what?"

"What did Eko really say to you, Zidler?" Bonnie wasn't shouting, but her voice was strong and steady.

He was silent for a long moment. Turning his gaze away, he answered, "Nothing of that matters right now. Can we go?"

Bonnie nodded, and they carefully walked over the rocks to reach the other side.

--

His bag was already open, and the journal was almost hanging out when she took it. Kim sat cross-legged in Fox's small shelter, flicking through the journal. As usual, it was only gibberish to her. Not unlike the English language when she had for the first time learned it.

"Divum… est… insolitus… super hic… super hero?" She smiled a little. "Quod… nos… es …curiosus… ut puto ut…"

"What are you d-doing?"

Kim looked up at Fox, the journal still in her hand. "Waiting for you of course." She smiled when she saw that he had brought breakfast, well, not to her. But she was still hungry.

Fox's gaze flickered from Kim, to the journal and to the notes scattered around her.

"So how is it going with these?" Kim waved with the journal. "You've had this for _ages._ I'm still curious. We could work on it together, like you and Brian used to do." She sent him another brilliant smile.

"Um, I…" Fox looked absolutely lost standing there. But Kim just continued to smile and she reached for one of the notes. Fox blinked. "No!"

Kim yelled and withdrew her hand quickly. Fox had dropped all the food, scattering it everywhere. He knelt to the ground and quickly collected all the notes, snatching the journal right out of her hands.

"Sorry." His face was pale, and he avoided looking at her the whole time.

That was just not a little weird.

"Kim, you there?" Andrea showed up in the entrance, she looked around at the mess, raising her eyebrows. "What exploded?"

Fox muttered something that neither Andrea nor Kim picked up. Shrugging, as if she was shaking off the weirdness of the situation, Andrea turned to Kim again. "Can we talk?"

"Um…" Kim looked at Fox, but he wasn't paying any attention to her at all. She pressed her lips into a thin line, and left without a word with Andrea out of the shelter.

Andrea must have noticed her irritation, and didn't say anything until they were at the outskirts of the camp, where no one was close to hear them.

"What?" Kim may have asked a little bit rude.

"It's not me you're angry at."

She sighed. "Sorry. What did you wanna talk about? Seems important."

"Fox."

"What about him?" Kim asked curiously, crossing her arms.

Andrea took a deep breath. "Do you trust him, Kim?"

Kim hesitated just a moment, but long enough for Andrea to notice. "Yeah, of course I do."

"Do you really?" she inquired further and Kim shifted her weight to her other foot uncomfortably.

"Why are you asking me this?"

"I think he's been acting suspicious. For the time we've been here on the camp, I've noticed things." Andrea paused, as if she was expecting Kim to protest. She continued when Kim didn't. "I don't… I don't think he was on the plane."

She stopped there, bit her lip. She looked encouraging at Kim, expecting something from her. But Kim stood silent, staring at her.

Then Kim said, in a low, serious tone, "You are crazy."

"Kim –"

"Must be the stress, I guess or something. I don't know why you would start to throw around… accusations, don't you remember what happened the last time you did that? Remember what you did to me?"

Andrea gaped and Kim continued, "You don't." She shook her head in disgust. "You didn't remember, throwing me down there in that pit. Just…"

Kim looked down, unable to find any more words. Andrea reached out a hand, opening her mouth but Kim avoided it, stomping away from her as quickly she could over the sand.

She abruptly came to a halt outside Fox's shelter. Anxiously she bit her lip. And she stepped inside.

Fox turned around, saying something but she interrupted him, "Okay. I don't know why you freaked out over me reading… that weird Latin that I don't even understand. And, I don't need an explanation. _Really,_" she added at the end when she clearly saw that he wanted to. "I won't look through your stuff again, promise." And then she worried expression on her face was gone and a big smile spread on her face. "Do you wanna take a walk?"

Fox, clearly confused, just stared at her.

"Did you hear what I said?"

Fox still didn't say anything. She was a bit worried she'd given him a heart attack by talking really fast. She waved her hand and said slowly, "Someone there?"

"Yeah, yeah." Fox came back to life and he smiled nervously.

"Okay, come on then." Fox looked like he hadn't been listening to her at all. And when he made no move, she stepped over the still spilled out breakfast and took his hand. "When you take a walk, you go. C'mon."

She dragged him out of the tent, chatting away happily about everything and nothing.

Andrea watched them as they went inside the jungle. And after one quick look around to see if anyone was looking at her, she sneaked inside Fox's tent.

She opened his backpack, and a few notes fell out. She gathered them together; taking the journal and hoped Fox and Kim wouldn't be back anytime soon.

--

"Even with Sean here, I don't think he would be able to fix it. Not even Sayid would…" Kaylee trailed off at the mention of the old friend, if you could call him that. He'd done a terrible thing. But they had all let it happen. And it wasn't like she could be the moral judge, not with what she'd done.

"I did not expect you to," Locke nodded at the broken satellite phone in her hand. "If what he is saying is true, Owen was the one to steal that from us, to steal his phone from him too."

Kay sighed lightly, glancing at the jungle at her side. "I guess we're not going after Owen, are we?"

"No use," Locke said, but he didn't say it in defeat, he almost sounded joyful, "she's not with us."

"It's because she's with the Others team, isn't it?" It was what everyone thought. And it frightened them, scared her. How long had she been on their side? Since she came back from her kidnap? What had they even done to convince the great Owen Chauncey?

Locke smiled. "The thing about Owen is that she's not on any team but her own."

--

"Hey."

Kate smiled a little when Phelps stumbled up on his feet, swaying a little on the spot and just barely managing not to trip over the sand.

He looked surprised at seeing her. His eyes blinking and flickering behind his glasses like he was looking for an escape.

"I wanted to thank you," Kate said, "for saving me. But I know liars; I know they will do anything to keep the lie. And I know you could be one."

"Err…" Phelps looked broken, but just because he looked like something didn't mean he was it. Kate gave him a nod and left him standing there, alone.

--

"My sister, Saki, she always understood me, though. She got that I just didn't want to stay in the same place my whole life. Some people when I tell them this goes 'oh, but Japan is so cultural' and stuff but when you grow up in it, you get used to it. And seeing other places, seeing… everything for the first time, again and again is…" Kim bit her lip as she tried to find the right word to describe it, "amazing,"

Fox nodded, like he'd done since Kim started to tell him her life story… again.

But this time she didn't continue telling him what'd happened after she'd left Japan to see the world, instead she said, putting her hands in the pockets of her jeans and looking amiably up at him, "So, have you traveled a lot?"

Fox was too shocked to have the question directed to him he just gaped. Kim smiled nervously. "Uh, um…" Where had his poor capability to speech gone?

"Or was that –" Fox grabbed her arm and she stopped.

"What?" she whispered, and then her eyes widened when she heard it too. Someone was walking through the jungle, but the trees were too close together, the vegetation too thick for them to see. Fox wished dearly he'd brought a gun with them, a knife, _anything._

Kim quietly, but quickly bent down to the ground and picked up a rock. She held it high, ready to throw it if necessary.

The leaves rustled, a sound, a whimper, a sob, and coming out from the bushes Fox saw a girl, carrying someone in her arms. Her hair was long, hanging in bloody tests and she was shaking, the person in her arms slipping out of her grip. The second her light brown eyes found his, she collapsed on the ground.

"WENDY!" Kim screamed, dropping the rock and rushing forward.

Fox only had his eyes for the broken person in her arms.

Karl.

----

There were so many.

Wendy clutched her bag and books closer to her chest as she watched all the fliers put up on the wall. _MISSING_ stood in big black and red letters, reward on some. They all looked different. Different faces, ethnicities, ages. And the moment she turned away she would forget every one of them.

It gnawed at her mind, that one day, would she become one of them?

Her friends always told her she read too many mystery books. And that most of those missing persons had probably run away from home.

She wondered if the little girl, dark brown eyes, chocolate skin and hair pulled into tiny braids had really left her mother's hand at that park that day, and decided to just get away.

She could hear her mother speak to the police, words getting through her mind but so far away. Right now she was describing how Mr. Erikson looked, no, they didn't have a picture of him. The man was about 6'4, over sixty years old, Asian. Eye color? Black. He'd been gone for a few days; no family that they knew of, a bit of a loner, no, they knew him; her daughter was good at sign language and was the last to see him.

"Wendy!"

Wendy swirled around, muttering to herself in French as she walked over to her mother and the police man. He looked kind, his blue eyes twinkling but he had deep wrinkles and his body was slumped in exhaustion.

She told him all she knew about her neighbor, which now, as she thought about it, wasn't much. It all passed by in a daze. She should have been more present, been more detailed in her answers. But as the cop reached for the coffee cup, she felt her own tiredness sneak in. She'd been up studying all night, and it wasn't by a mere notation by her mother about how Mr. Erikson's house having been dark the past few days that she would even had noticed that she hadn't spoken to him in a week.

"Do you know how many people go missing each year, mom?" Wendy said, and the lampposts lit as they walked over the street, lightning up half of her as the other half was still in the shadows.

"Many," Mrs. Reyes answered.

----

Kim didn't need to check the guy's pulse. Karl. Karl as Fox had said, with his eyes big and terrified as he stared at the body. Karl was pale as a ghost, the red of his blood only making him look whiter. His lips were blue, his eyes closed and his bones were broken. They didn't know for how long he had been dead. But Wendy was reaching for him, saying nothing but her eyes saying enough for them to understand that all she wanted was for him to wake up.

"What happened?" "Wendy!" "Are you all right?" "Was it the traps?" "What happened to you, Wendy?" "Isn't he the Other?"

Voices, people, Karl was laid on the ground. Wendy knelt down beside him, stroking his hair out of his face and sobbing hard.

"What happened?"

Kim felt too weak to answer. She couldn't stand anymore and trembling, she sat down on the sand. She pulled up her knees to her chest, hugging herself and rocking slightly back and forth while staring at the body – Karl.

Bloody. Messy. Torn. _Broken._

Kim's vision became blurry and she realized she was crying.

"Everybody BACK OFF!"

Andrea was suddenly there. Small, strong, blonde hair flying behind her as she hurried over to them, blue eyes serious as she studied the situation in just a few seconds.

She was so glad Andrea was there.

"I said back off!" Andrea roared. "Stop asking bloody stupid questions!" She glanced at Karl, saw his broken form and Kim saw, saw in her eyes that she decided he was a lost cause.

Dead. He was dead. Of course no one could save him.

"Sun!"

Sun turned to Andrea, but her eyes flickered nervously to Karl and Wendy. "Get some water. Libby! Get Jack's medical kit. I need you both. Locke! Help me get Wendy back to her tent."

But as Locke leaned down to help Wendy up on her feet, Kim was there. Locke gave her a serious look, reprimanding but not mean.

"I have to," Kim said, and she knew he understood. "Wendy, come on," she said gently, trying to make her stand.

Wendy shook her head, determined to sit down. She clawed at Locke's hands. She didn't want to go. She wanted to stay with him. But he was dead. Did she know that? Didn't she see that?

"Come on, Wendy, please." They both forced her to stand up. She fought against them, but she was weak. Her struggling tiring her out, sweat breaking out on her forehead and then she just got limp.

Locke, gritting his teeth took her up in his arms and Kim had to jog to keep up with his pace as he carried Wendy away to her tent.

"It's called shock," Andrea snarled to someone who'd dared to ask, and she helped Locke lay Wendy down in her sleeping place.

"Kim."

"Yes?"

"I need a blanket, and Locke I need someone to take care of – you know – "

"I know." Locke left and Kim handed Andrea the blanket, her hand trembling so much she almost dropped it.

"Now where is the bloody medical kit?"

In just that moment Libby and Sun came into the shelter. Wendy was so still you could believe she was asleep, laying completely apathetic there on the ground, but her eyes were open, staring at nothing above her and she wasn't making a sound.

"Kim, I need you to leave," Andrea took off the cork of the water bottle, "Sun, you too. Stay close in case I need you. Don't let anybody enter."

"Wendy!"

Kim, Andrea, Libby and Sun all turned around. Margo stood in the entrance, the red beret still on her head. She made a little squeal when she saw Wendy lay there. And as she leaped forward, closing her arms around her friend Kim thought that she maybe she hadn't noticed the blood, the dead look in Wendy's eyes as she did nothing to return the embrace, and the dead body outside.

--

Kaylee looked away from the place where Locke was burying the Other's body, turning to Dom instead.

"It's horrible."

Dom was staring out at the sea.

"Um, Dom? Dominic?"

Dom frowned slightly, but he made no other acknowledgment to have heard her.

"So," Kay said, clearing her throat, "fixing the satellite phone is beyond any possibility, at least Locke says so, and I'm definitely no expert." Dom still didn't look at her. "But I think we have a chance. There must be some batteries and stuff lying around; there are lots of baggage we haven't searched through and… _Dom!_"

Dom's head snapped around. He looked like he'd just woken up. "What?"

Kay crossed her arms, looking into his eyes. "Kate told me some things. About what happened in the hatch, she is awfully vague but I understood enough. Dom, how did you know?"

"Know what?" And his tone was drawled out, so unlike him. It was like she was speaking to a stranger.

"How you knew where the key was, how to – blow the whole pace up."

Dom stared at her. And she felt even more uneasy under his gaze.

"You shouldn't try to fix it," Dom said quickly, "the satellite phone. Don't."

All previous thoughts rushed out of Kay's head and were replaced by anger. "Haven't we've already been over this?" she said a little too loud. "I don't – I won't be like you, okay? I won't be selfish. I want to get off this island – everyone else does too and they deserve to get rescued and if it means that I'm going into jail – I don't care!" she shouted. And then, in a lower voice, "Do you really want to save yourself so much that you would – that you would rather not have the rest of us rescued?" She was so afraid she was right. "And maybe it's already too late. Have you asked that Fred guy if he knows we're – you're a criminal?"

"Does that mean you believe him?"

And that was really all he had to say to her?

She turned around, anger boiling inside of her as she walked quickly away from him. She would fix the damn satellite phone if it so killed her. She walked into the jungle, but not after telling Kate where she was going.

--

"Guys…"

Zidler stood up from the plant he'd been inspecting. The blood there had been red, fresher Bernard had said, wrinkling his nose. And that meant that Eko had to be close.

Exchanging a worried glance at Bonnie's voice, Bernard and Zidler walked out from the tall trees. They were both tired, sweaty by the journey and they had no idea how anyone who was as badly hurt like Eko could've gone this far.

The sky seemed darker here, Zidler thought. The forest seemed bluer.

The big ship in front of them, in the middle of the jungle, vines growing up on its side, seemed misplaced.

"How did it get here?" Bernard asked, staring at the big ship in fear and awe.

"That's… that's kind of…" Zidler stuttered, "Tsunami, must have been a tsunami right? 'Cause these things just don't happen."

"On this island it does," Bonnie answered shortly. She took out her gun. "Do you remember Locke telling us about the dynamite?"

"Which is exactly why you took out the gun. I… we shouldn't go in there. He wouldn't have gone –"

"He gotta be in there."

"Why… why would he even go in there? How did he know there was a huge ship called the Black Rock lying around in the middle of _a jungle? _A jungle!"

"You tell me," Bonnie stepped over a root, making her way to the hole in the hull, "you were the one he whispered sweet nothings to, Zidler."

Bonnie stepped inside the wreck; Zidler trailed behind her, Bernard following apprehensively after him.

Light seeped through the cracks in the hull and the roof, illuminating the chains, the cracks, the crates and the jungle that had come to grow inside the shipwreck. In the midst of it all, Eko was standing with his back at them, opening one of the crates.

They were labeled _EXPLOSIVE._

"Eko," Bonnie said in a warning tone, staying where she stood.

Eko didn't make any acknowledgment to have heard her. Zidler saw that he was uncovering the dynamite. His breath got caught in his throat, he found it difficult to breathe and he lost what Bonnie was saying, her tone sharp, strong, but still so scared. Bernard stumbled out from the wreck behind him at the words of 'unstable' and 'exploding' and he regained his senses again.

"Steve exploded!" was all he managed to shout at first, his voice squeaky.

"Scott did." Zidler wasn't sure if Bonnie was right.

"Eko, stop!" Bonnie was exasperated, her words had no impact on him. "What the hell are you doing? Leave the dynamite. It's very unstable. Can't you – what are you doing?"

Eko's leg had been crushed – it'd been broken and now he was standing on it. And through the small light, when Eko shifted, Zidler saw that it still was. His pants were ripped at the end, over his bruised ankle and his feet was twisted to the side, white bone seen through the dark flesh and blood.

And he was still standing.

Eko picked something up, and Bonnie cried out incoherent words at the sight of the match.

--

"She's in shock. She needs to be alone," Andrea stated again.

"No, I'm staying – I'm – I'm her friend." Margo held her arm around tighter around Wendy. Looking like a little child when she pouted. "She wants me to stay."

Andrea was nice enough to not point out that Wendy had not said a word to her, or anyone. And that they had no idea what she wanted, less what she was thinking.

"Wendy," Andrea said gently, deciding to let Margo stay there for now, "will you look at me?"

Wendy didn't, and instead Andrea searched her gaze, pretending that the girl was really seeing her. "I know that everything feels terrible right now. I know that you're tired and just want it all to go away. But I need you to tell me what happened to you."

Andrea glanced at Margo and saw that she was curious too. Wendy didn't answer.

"Wendy, honey." Andrea took one of her hands. "Do you remember what happened?"

"Wendy," Margo said too. But she was unresponsive. "Come on, answer."

Andrea nodded to herself. "Okay. There's no need for you to talk right now. If you just want to rest we'll let you all right?"

Wendy nodded slightly, and Andrea almost laughed in relief.

"All right." Margo let go of Wendy's shoulders and gently helped her lay down. She pulled a blanket over her, tucked her in like she was a little child. She bit her lip, and after a moment of hesitation she took off her beret.

"I kept it for you when you were gone," she whispered, laying it beside Wendy who had closed her eyes. "And now you're back… After so many days… Thank you. Thank you for coming back."

She turned to Andrea, and she saw her eyes were glistening with tears. "I'll stay."

Andrea nodded. "Okay." She stood up and had almost left when she turned around. Margo was stroking Wendy's hair, a sad smile on her lips.

Andrea left. Her heart heavy in her chest as she wondered what'd happened to the girl.

----

Wendy's hair was plastered to her temple, and with annoyance she wiped off sweat of her lip. She was one of the misfortunate ones to be out on such a hot day, and not down by the beach or inside with air conditioner cooling.

She thought of relaxing back home on her couch, a cold drink in her hand. The universe sure liked to torture her today. She'd spilled milk all over the paper she'd been writing all night. That may not seem as something that would make her hate the universe, but it was a _very_ good paper. And now she had to start all over again.

That was why she was out on the street, trying not to die of the heat, carrying loads of books in her bag, glaring at the few ones out, sitting in coffee shops or inside stores with _air conditioner._ There had never been a more beautiful invention at the moment.

And that was why she was surprised to see an old man, rise up from the park bench he'd been sitting on, throw down a newspaper in anger and making a very foul sign that even the woman shouting at him could understand.

"I don't understand!" she shouted in frustration. "Can't you write? I have a pen…" She looked inside her purse. "No I don't."

She didn't understand. But Wendy did.

She looked down at her bag, full with books and thought longingly of cold water, and then at them again. Sighing, she crossed the street.

"Excuse me," she said and they both turned to her. Wendy smiled awkwardly. "I…" She swallowed. "I can help translate if you want. He's… it's sign language."

"Yes I knew that." The woman gave her a condescending glare, but then her features softened. "Sorry. He wrote to me earlier that he had some information, I –" She opened her purse again, taking out a picture. It was of her, and a man wearing a red shirt against a beautiful view of a harbor. "I'm looking for him, and he," she turned to the man, "has information about him."

"All right." Wendy asked the man, hand gestures that probably meant nothing to the woman, if it was true. And he nodded in enthusiasm, happy that she wasn't yelling at him.

"What's his name?" Wendy asked her, as the man continued to sign.

"Desmond Hume. I'm Penelope Widmore."

"Wendy," she said. "He's seen him, that man." Wendy frowned in confusion as the man continued. "How did he exactly… how did he go missing?"

"He was in a sailing race around the world. He never came back. Where have you seen him?"

"He saw him on an island. But…" Wendy turned to the old man again, _Are you sure?_ she signed.

The man only nodded.

Penelope looked from him to her. "What? What does he…?"

"He says he saw that man on an island…. exactly as he is on the picture, maybe a year or two older, but the same. He saw him… over twenty years ago."

Penelope was silent for a long time, just stared at her wide-eyed.

"Nice of you to waste my time." She looked like she was about to cry in anger. "Good joke."

She started to walk away.

"Wait!" Wendy shouted. "It wasn't – I wasn't joking! He was really –" She turned to the man but he was leaving too. Just as the woman rounded the corner, Wendy yelled, "I'll keep an eye out for him!"

----

"Eko! Don't!"

Eko put down the dynamite on top of the cargo. His arms were still bleeding, and with great difficulty he tried to light the match.

"Leave. I can handle this," sputtered Bonnie. "If one blows up they all will." She raised her gun higher.

Zidler, his face pale and terrified, stayed. It was all so surreal. Eko blind to them, to their words, in trance despite the horrid pain he had to be in and then with Bonnie screaming, threatening, Zidler shut his eyes.

_Not happening. Not happening. Not happening. _

"If you light it I WILL SHOOT YOU!"

Zidler wondered whys he didn't just go there, drag him away, knock him out.

And then he saw the knife. And he was dragged back to reality cruelly fast.

"I will shoot you!"

"Don't," Zidler begged her. But Bonnie looked crazy, tests of hair coming loose and her eyes wide and her teeth showing as she clenched them in anger. The safety off on the gun, she was ready to shoot.

"Eko!" Zidler screamed, and he hated how his voice shook. "Please, Eko, wake up!" And Bonnie stared at him like he was the crazy one at the last words.

Eko lit the match.

It was as if the world stopped. The wind stopped rustling the leaves outside; Bonnie's screams faded away, all that was there was the sound from the small flame.

_BANG!_

Zidler jumped. Bonnie had fired. Eko dropped the match, collapsing on his leg. A single bullet had torn and drilled its way through his flesh and bone. Eko laid still.

And the little flame died.

--

Kaylee whistled to herself as she ducked under the branch. She was still slightly annoyed over having met Neil in the middle of the jungle, telling her to be 'extra careful' because his traps were 'extra dangerous.'

But actually, she was enjoying the fresh air. Charlie, back at the camp, had once said there was nothing but fresh air all around them. But it was something different, out there in the jungle without all the chaos surrounding one. She frowned at the thought of Kate and Dom.

None of them told her anything. Sure, they talked, they laughed and sometimes their smiles weren't even fake. But something had happened there in the hatch, after it, that both of them were still scarred by. And they wouldn't tell her why.

She froze in the spot. She'd thought she'd heard something.

"Don't turn around!" someone shouted.

She turned around.

_SNAP! _

She screamed and was thrown to the ground. She could hear the arrow whizz over her head.

Panting, she raised her head a little, spit out dirt and grass from her mouth. "Oh," she exclaimed when she saw the sharp arrow stuck in the tree behind her.

"You okay?" She looked into Dom's eyes, and still a little shaken up, she nodded.

"Good," he answered, helping her up in a sitting position. He was surprisingly gentle, and his silence made it easier for her to think, to realize what the hell had just happened.

She looked over her shoulder at the arrow. "You just – you pushed me – the arrow..." She shook her head, a little twig falling down on her shoulder from her hair. "Were you following me?"

"What?" Dom's eyes narrowed in anger. "That's the first thing that comes to your mind? I just saved your life!"

"You're not answering my question."

Dom stood up, shaking his head and he looked away. "Not even a thank you?"

"You're never answering my questions!" Kaylee stood up, brushing away leaves and dirt from her clothes. Dom didn't say anything, and after a moment of hesitation she hit him on the arm.

He threw his hands up in the air. "Seriously?"

"What happened to you?" She shouted, too loud in the silent forest. "In the hatch, after it, what happened that's so terrible neither you nor Kate can talk about it? Not even with me?

"I just woke up –"

"Don't lie!" she spat. "Don't you dare lie anymore, Dominic. Not to me. Not after everything we've been through together. Just tell me, please."

Dom was silent for a long time, and then he turned around, couldn't face her any longer. "You should ask Kate. And then you'll know why."

--

The waves from the ocean kept her shoes and feet soaked. Now and then there would come a huge wave, almost drowning her and Lori would be forced to run up on the sand, almost into the jungle and she would lose her sense of direction. She would stay there, out of breath, hoping, praying that she hadn't changed from her path.

She almost wished she hadn't knocked that girl Alex out. Almost wished she'd let her come with her. But that meant letting one of them in, and that meant that Alex might end up with a bullet through her head by Lori's people.

It was better this way, she decided, her stomach burning with hunger and her throat hoarse with thirst. Better this way.

Sometimes the world around her would go silent. And she would once again feel too much. _Death._ She could smell it. On the island it was so different. It was the past, the present, the future all at once and she was so…

No, not afraid. Lorraine Hume wasn't frightened.

She was absolutely terrified.

She jumped, whirled around when she heard something move from the jungle in the bushes. She took a harder grip around the small log she'd knocked Alex out with.

And then she heard the barks, and she knelt down to the ground, laughing and smiling as she patted the Labrador.

"Vincent!" She grinned widely, throwing her arms around the dog. "Hey boy, what are you doing out here? You here to help me home?"'

--

They hadn't been able to carry him back.

After she'd shot him, she'd rushed to his side. She'd expected Eko to groan in pain, come to his senses anything but dead silence and unseeing eyes. Zidler had thrown up behind her, and she'd hear Bernard return, his loud frantic voice shouting things she didn't want to hear. Was he okay? What happened? Oh God is he – he isn't – did you?

They buried him by the wreck. If you rose your head, you would see the inscription in the ship, The Black Rock.

Bonnie cleared her throat. "Eko was…" She swallowed, it sounded like she was choking on nothing but her words. And she went silent.

Zidler was sitting down. He was just staring at nothing. Bernard was standing just beside her, his hands clasped behind his back, his eyes turned to the ground in sadness. But no one spoke.

She hadn't meant to kill him. A shot to the leg shouldn't have been possible. But, as Bernard remarked in shock as they put his body deep in earth, Eko shouldn't have been alive at all before with the wounds he had.

"He was a…" What was he? A priest? A hunter? A hero? He had died in such confusion. She couldn't understand how the hell it had been necessary. In movies she'd starred in, the main characters death would always have a meaning. She had no idea what this one was.

She lowered her head. "I'm sorry."

--

Kaylee returned to the camp, having glared at Dom's back all the way. Sighing, she glanced sideways where she saw a small group of people staring at Wendy's shelter. Further down the beach, Locke had given Phelps a shovel, and together they were digging a grave.

Kate was sitting down the beach, her feet were in the water and when Kay approached her she started to talk, without even turning around.

"I know I should be afraid. But I've always liked the sea, reminds me of when Dom and I were kids, our mom used take us to the beach to sink."

"Sink?" Kay asked.

Kate smiled, looking down. "The waves roll in, takes the sand with it and you sink. Dom was always too impatient to do it for very long. So I stayed with mom, always did."

"Kate," Kay said seriously, "I want you to tell me now what happened to you after the hatch."

Kate's smile disappeared and she turned her head to her, but not meeting her eye just like Dom. "I've already told you."

"I want the truth this time. And if you won't tell me it, Kate, I'm telling everyone."

"Telling everyone what?"

"You know what. And in this case I don't care about myself. I don't care if they all know. Please, Kate, tell me."

"I'm not telling –"

Kay grabbed her arm as Kate had tried to leave. "Yes you will."

"You don't understand –"

"Try me."

"You…" Kate bit her lip. "You will think I'm crazy."

Kay smiled. "I almost do right now."

Kate sighed and she sat down on the sand with her feet still in the water. "It was the Marshal."

Kay sat down beside her. Kate was looking like she was about to cry. Carefully she asked, "What?"

"I woke up and he was there."

"Kate… He's dead."

"I know. I shot him." She looked down, and she took up a fistful of sand in her hand. "But he was there. And Kay – he – he was angry. Very angry." The sand slipped through her fingers. "He… he hurt me. He was the one who hurt me. He blamed me. He said it was all about me. And it got dark, everything – I was in the caves and everything was dark but _he didn't stop._ He didn't stop, Kay. And every time I close my eyes, I see him. And he's somewhere, ready to hurt me."

"Kate…" Kay took her hand. "He can' hurt you. He's – he's dead."

"No… he's somewhere in my mind."

Kay's eyes widened in shock, nut not from what Kate had just said. She stood up slowly and Kate turned her head. "Is that… is that Lori?"

--

"What's up?" was the first thing Lorraine Hume said when she came back to the camp.

Hurley wrapped her up in a tight hug and she laughed a little. "Nice to hear you again, man"

"Yay!" little Ellie exclaimed, and she hugged Lori's leg. Then she jumped back, clapping her hands. "Where's daddy? Everyone said he'd come back soon!"

Lori didn't know what to say. And soon the happy chatter faded as they noticed that she'd arrived alone. She swallowed, how the hell was she going to explain this?

She opened her mouth to say something. And then she suddenly took a step back. She whirled around.

"What? What is it?"

"No – no." The death, someone new, lost, dead, here, right here had someone – a he – died. She fell backwards.

It was Desmond who caught her.

"Des?" she asked in a small voice.

"I'm here, I'm here, little sis. 'S gonna be all right."

"Let's get her to Andrea," she heard Kaylee said.

And she nodded weakly.

----

"Why are you always at the nut house, mom?"

Mrs. Reyes dropped her bag in shock when she saw her daughter sit in the living room couch. "Oh, mi amor, you startled me."

Wendy held the cup tighter in her hands. Her fingers were red from the heat, and she hadn't taken a single sip from the tea. She was staring blindingly in front of her.

"It must be depressing," Wendy continued in the same monotone voice, "all those people there, crazy people. Locked in 'cause they're too insane to be let out. All those wasted lives and stupid dreams."

"But, Wendy…" Mrs. Reyes stopped herself when she saw her daughter's red eyes, the shivering lower lip, the sweaty skin. "Is something wrong?"

Wendy chuckled, and tea ran down from the cup. "Everything is. All is wrong, wrong, wrong."

Warily, Mrs. Reyes moved towards her daughter.

"You know Olivia?" Wendy still just looked forward. "She's mute. She's one of the kids I'm helping, babysitting, tutoring you know. She… she never smiles. She can't… she can't scream. That's why they didn't know."

"Know what?" She asked carefully.

"She told me she fell a lot," Wendy said quickly, "but she never did fall when I was with her. I should have known. I should've seen. She was always so sad, and she didn't – and she refused – and she was ashamed – and… and… I should've known her parents abused her and I should've been there for her and she was always so scared and I never knew." She took a deep breath. "'Cause I'm so frickin' blind!" Wendy screamed.

"Wendy Aurora –"

"I should've known, mom! I have no excuse! It was so obvious and I just – It's crazy mom. I'm crazy 'cause I didn't see that. Everyone's crazy 'cause who could hurt a child? Who could just look in their eyes and want to – want to hurt them?"

"Wendy! Stop."

"And they were so cruel and she just won't sign to me and no one will understand her and now she will be taken away from her home and she's so scared –"

"WENDY!"

"But she does nothing but stare and I would tell my friends she was a bit strange. Just 'cause – I told them she was strange! And it's my fault too! It's my fa – "

Her mother slapped her across her cheek. Wendy dropped the cup of tea all over her and she shut silent. Her hands trembled and her body burned. Her mother dragged her away from the cough, embracing her, holding her up on her legs.

Wendy didn't cry.

And Wendy whispered in her ear, "Do you know how many of all those missing girls and boys have been kidnapped, have been hurt?"

----

"Lori's back," Margo told her friend, giving her some water, "she said you weren't at the same place as her, she thought at least. She was glad you were…" Okay didn't seem like the right word, did it?

Wendy drank from the water, and she looked at her. Margo almost laughed with relief. She wasn't some numb apathetic… zombie, Zidler would've said.

She still was afraid she would look away, her eyes going dim, unseeing again.

"She said Jack was all right the last time she heard him. Sean too. She said Jack made them free her. So that means… that means that they're willing to make deals. I don't know if that's a good thing yet."

Wendy gave back the water bottle and Margo took it. She stared at her for a long moment, feeling her throat choke up and tears well up in her eyes. "I'm so glad you're back. I – I missed you so much. And I'm so sorry that I made you lie. Was…" Was it her fault? Wendy getting taken? The thought popped up in her mind, but it was too horrible for her to say out loud. "I told everyone. I told them the truth. Told them I was pregnant."

She took a deep breath, and slid her fingers into Wendy's, holding her hand. "Please just say you're okay."

"They're back!"

Margo looked up and saw Sun, she was pointing at the direction of the jungle. "Bonnie's back!"

Margo jumped up on her feet. She glanced Wendy's way and saw that she'd closed her eyes, lying back and taking the blanket over her body, to rest.

She hurried after Sun out of the shelter. And joined the people running towards Bonnie, Bernard and… Zidler.

"Where's Eko? What happened?" Kaylee asked.

Rose hugged Bernard. Zidler looked like he was about to throw up so it was Bonnie who spoke.

"Eko is…" She looked down. "He's dead."

Silence.

"We were too late."

Zidler stumbled away from the group asking questions, away from the confusion and shock. Margo followed him with her gaze. Behind her, Lori had cheerfully said 'But I'm still here, right?'

"Zidler…" Margo caught up to him by the tree line, away from everyone else. He stopped, but didn't look at her but down at the ground. She took his hand. "Hey," she said gently, her lips curling upwards but not in a real smile, "what happened?"

"I… I… Bonnie, she'll explain." She let go of his hand, and he walked away from her.

----

"I'm not crazy, mom," Wendy Reyes said with a sigh.

"Let the doctor decided that, dear." Mrs. Reyes patted her hand.

Wendy turned to the doctor. "Dude, she forced me to take internet schizophrenia tests. Those are _freaky._"

The doctor did not look too happy on being referred to as 'dude'. He pursed his lips, turning to her mother. "With the fact that mental health disorder is genetic, I say you made the right choice to come here."

"Whoa," Wendy put her hands up, "genetic? You mean…" She looked at her mother. "Well, that explains a lot."

Mrs. Reyes raised an eyebrow in distaste. "He is not talking about me."

"I'm talking about your brother;" the doctor said.

Mrs. Reyes got up to her feet in one split second, holding Wendy's hand hard.

"Brother?" she asked in confusion, looking from her mother to the doctor. "Mom…"

"Let's go." Mrs. Reyes dragged her daughter out of the room. The doctor rushed after them but her mother didn't stop for anything. Wendy protested vaguely. She was just happy she didn't have to take one of those tests to see if she was nuts or not. Though, her mom should take one of those.

----

The camp was lit with bonfires scattered all around the beach. Zidler had been staying away from everyone, even from Margo. He couldn't stand the looks people gave him, the blame. With force he kicked the sand, again and again. And then he continued to go down by the beach, further and further away from the people by the camp.

He slowed down when he saw a hunched figure sit by the graves. She turned her head to look at him and he saw that it was Wendy.

"Hey." He knew she was back. But he hadn't seen her. Too caught up with his own problems. But now he saw her, he saw that she was real, it wasn't a lie she was there.

She turned back around, and didn't say anything to him.

He sat down beside her and saw that she was sitting by a newly dug grave without a cross. Instead on the sand, someone had laid out small stones to form the name _Karl._

"We were out looking after Eko today. Bonnie told everyone we found him in the jungle; dead from his wounds after… whatever animal attacked him earlier on."

She wrapped the blanket she had over her shoulders tighter around her. Her dark hair blew in her face from the wind but she didn't bother to brush it away.

"She lied."

Wendy bit her lip, shuddering despite that it wasn't cold.

"He… he died from his wounds but not in that way. We found him in an old shipwreck, the one with dynamite, in the middle of the jungle. He was… he was trying to light the dynamite, make it go boom. He wasn't – he wasn't himself. It was like he was sleepwalking and he – we tried to stop him but he wouldn't… So, Bonnie… she… she shot him."

She looked up, surprised.

"But it wasn't her who killed him. Earlier on, as I said, he was attacked. But… I could've saved him. I was there, I saw him down there in the ravine and I ran away – but – but it's not only that. Wendy… I heard that creature, that monster and I knew it was hurting him… and I just ran. I… I pretended that if I could make it back to the camp… But I didn't. He's dead now."

Zidler looked down, fighting back the tears. "I didn't know Karl. I knew who he was, an Other. And I – I hated him for that. I hated him because he was one of them. One of the ones who took Claire, Owen… even though I guess she was – is one of the too. But…" He looked back at the grave, and beside him, Wendy began to cry silently. "He saved you, didn't he? And that… that I'm thankful for. 'Cause after all, that must've meant he cared about you. And I care about you, Wendy. You're my friend. And… and it wasn't the same when you were gone."

Wendy sobbed and he put an arm around her shoulder. She leaned in, her body shaking with each sob and the tears kept falling. But she wouldn't say anything.

"You don't have to," he whispered. Even though he knew she had no idea what he was talking about.

In the trees, hidden by the dark, Frederic Phelps was watching them. He swallowed, remembering a moment like that, a long time ago.

Florence had to be with those Others.

He just knew it.

--

**Author's Notes:** Thank you guys for your bloody brilliant, baffling reviews!

To recap: People like to gaze out at the sea. People seem to enjoy dying by the monster. People, like Kate, like to enjoy being crazy.

Life's so hectic right now! So, a warning, next chapter may be a little late. Well, a lot. I'm dying of stress. Seriously. AND I HATE JVC CAMERAS WITH ALL MY HEART! I could actually cry with frustration right now.

Namaste.


	39. Fate

Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight  
Was it not Fate, (whose name is also Sorrow,)  
That bade me pause before that garden-gate,  
To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses?

(Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!)

_No footstep stirred: the hated world an slept,_  
_Save only thee and me. (Oh, Heaven! oh, God!_  
_How my heart beats in coupling those two words!)_  
_Save only thee and me. I paused - I looked_  
_And in an instant all things disappeared._

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 32, Fate**

--

She wondered now, if her life was useless. Flor thought about _It's a Wonderful Life,_ in that movie George's life had touched so many. His hadn't been worthless, the world was better off with him alive. He had a fate.

She had believed that. Those little things you did could make a bigger impact on someone else's life. It gave everything a purpose, a meaning.

Rosalie.

If she hadn't… if she hadn't been alive then Rosalie wouldn't be dead. Was that the horrid thing they'd been talking about? That awful thing she was going to do, the thing no one spoke of.

She snuggled closer to Sean. Her eyes were closed, and she kept them that way. She could pretend that the strong arms embracing her could keep anything – the world, _them_ – out.

"Good morning," he whispered, and she felt his lips brush against her forehead.

"No." She didn't want it to be morning. Not just yet.

"Flor!" She opened her eyes. Sean looked scared, he was staring at something behind her and she turned her head.

"No," she whispered.

That woman, Lalah opened the cage door. They told her to get up. They told Sean to get away. He held onto her harder, but they raised their guns, took her from his arms.

The hood was brought over her head; the sticky material got wet by her tears. They tied her hands up. She heard Sean scream, shout, his protests useless, but still she silently begged in her mind for him not to do something stupid that would risk his life.

Hers was ending.

Flor didn't see where she was taken. She glanced down but could only see squints of the floor and of her feet. Would that be the last thing she saw? Or would it be the end of the barrel that sent her to her death?

"No," she whispered at the thought, and she tried to wriggle herself out of their harsh grips. But they only gripped her tighter, their fingers and nails bruising her skin. "Please, no, haven't done anything, haven't done anything."

She heard a door open, and she stumbled over the threshold. The room was, in difference to the other places in the building, chillingly cold.

They forced her down on her knees, and her pleadings got louder and more frantic. "No, no, no, it's not my destiny... I'm not supposed to... _please_. I beg you – please, not now – you said – please."

She heard the sound of a gun's safety being released and she froze. She wouldn't see anything. Only darkness. It would hurt. _Dead. Jeremy. Her son. _

They whispered amongst each other. And then the felt the gun against her temple though the hood. She was shivering hard. "Please."

The shot echoed around the room.

--

**24 hours earlier**

--

It fell like she'd just fallen asleep. When suddenly the leaves rustled in the trees, a twig snapped and she was wide awake, despite the pain already up on her feet.

But there was no one there. Sean was lying asleep in his cage. The security camera was as always watching them. But there was no one around to hurt her.

Flor took a deep breath to calm herself down. The sky was a morning gray, but she could see the sunlight through the clouds. But there was no way she was going back to sleep, back to the dreams – nightmares.

She closed her eyes for a second. Remembering Rosalie, this time she'd been screaming, and there had been nothing Flor could've done to prevent her from falling. She hadn't known where she would fall, but she knew that the moment she let go of Rosalie's hand – it would all be over. Not just Rosalie's life, but hers too. And Jeremy… Flor frowned. She couldn't remember where he'd been in the dream, but her son had been there… somewhere.

Flor sat down on the ground, her hair tucked behind her ears and shoulder slumped until _they _came.

The twins were unusually silent though, not saying much, not anything she could hear anyway. They opened the door to Sean's cage. And Sean woke up; up on his feet so fast it had to make him dizzy.

But Flor wasn't looking at them anymore. She was looking at Claret.

Claret stood quietly on the side, watching with sad eyes as the twins forced Sean out of his cage.

"Time for work," one of them sneered.

Sean's eyes locked with hers.

"What about her?"

"Don't worry;" the other one said and laughed. "We'll treat her nice."

Flor bit her lip. She was scared to say something, to protest. She didn't want to be hurt again. Ivan…

Claret stayed, waited, until the twins and Sean were gone. Then she, with slow steps, walked over to her cage.

"So," she said, and swallowed, her hand trembling, but Flor didn't think she noticed it, "do you believe in God?"

It was such a random question that Flor just gaped. "Uh, um, what?"

"God? Do you believe in Him?"

"Why…" Flor shook her head. "Why are you asking me this? Do you want to know my coffin size?"

Claret looked down, almost like she was ashamed. "Well… um, it's just in case you want me to say a few words. Maybe read from the bible. And… there will be no coffin. You are going to be… uh… cremated."

"What?" she whimpered.

"It has been decided that you will be executed," Claret said quickly, tears welling up in her eyes. "Tomorrow. You are suffering, Flor. And it will be more humane –"

Claret yelled as Flor reached through the bars, grabbing her arm, hard.

"Okay!" Flor shouted. "So, you guys brought me here. Good. _Nice_."

Claret winced, struggling, but Flor was surprisingly strong.

"You told me you would let me see my son again. All just…" She laughed hysterically, "… fine in the world. Just have to set one of you free – Benjamin. Good? No." She shook her head. "Rosalie dies and it all goes to hell!"

"Flor…"

"One month, one month you tell me! And then you'll kill me. Then, then Ivan shows up. And he – he makes me _suffer._ And it wasn't like I was suffering enough with having another… life on my conscience." Tears began to well up in her eyes.

"And yes, karma and morals says I should be dead. But you want to know a secret, Claret?" She smiled, despite the lonely tear that fell down her face. "I want to live. If I could, I would live forever. But_ not_ without my son. And I swear that I won't die, not until he is safe. So you… you can go back, and tell them – tell _him_ that the rules have changed. I won't let you kill me!"

Flor released the grip around Claret, almost like she had been burned. She looked shocked at what she'd done, and took a step back.

They were both crying now.

"You don't have a choice – I – I'm so sorry," Claret sobbed, and then spun on her heel and left.

--

"– It's just a few more days, Lalah."

"Shephard can't stay here."

"Shephard and I have a deal. He's going to fulfill it; Diane is as we speak giving him his orders. But… it's not really Shephard we are talking about, is it?" He stared at her, his gaze intent like he knew exactly what she was thinking. "I need you here, Lalah. Do you understand?"

Lalah pressed her lips into a thin line. Not believing the pleading look on Ben's face for a second.

"Of course," she replied, throwing her hair back behind her shoulder. "But then, why did you order the boat to –"

"We need to send Gonzales back to the island."

Lalah furrowed her brow. "What?"

"Claret saw him."

"I hope when you said you would send him back to the island you meant somethin' like Hawaii, 'cause we both know that Gonzales is not supposed to be here."

Ben pursed his lips. "And you're basing this conclusion on what exactly, Lalah?"

Lalah was silent. Then, she turned around.

"What is it?" Ben asked, and just a moment later Richard stepped into the room. He glanced at the monitors, his eyes going to the one where Jim was recovering in. And then to the other where Claret had just informed Florence Bluth about her execution.

Richard turned to her. "Lalah –"

"I got it. You two want some alone time." Lalah flashed a smile his way and he smiled faintly back.

She continued to smile amiably until the door close behind her. When it was, her features smoothened out to an expressionless mask as she walked down the corridor.

Number one of today's protocol: Check on the prisoner.

When Lalah arrived outside Janna's cell, she could immediately see how Janna was going to be today. Her lips were drawn upwards in not an actual smirk, but close to one and her eyes were almost sparkling.

"You look lovely with your hair out." Her voice was airy.

"Sit down in the…" Lalah's voice trailed off as Janna turned around and flopped down in the corner.

Lalah brought in the tray with breakfast. Keeping eye-contact with Janna as she put it down on the floor, she had been fooled by the same act once before – many times before. She'd lost count on how many times Janna had escaped – and tried to.

But Janna just laughed a little at her behavior, taking the bread. "You want to share? There's plenty. And you do look hungry."

"I'm not."

"You are," Janna teased her, chuckling; "I can read people. I see you've already had a really bad…" She looked up, and Lalah knew she had to be wondering what time it was. "Morning. Haven't been allowed to shoot anyone yet?"

"Not yet. But tomorrow I got a little execution to take care of."

Janna's hand froze in mid-air, hovering above the water bottle, and the smile disappeared off her face like someone had switched it off.

"For Florence Bluth," Lalah said slowly. _Not for you, not if I can_… she interrupted her own thought, swallowing hard.

Janna was perfectly still, staring into her eyes.

Lalah had seen that spark in her eye before.

Janna lashed out with the glass in her hand. But Lalah was ready for her, ducking, jumping back on her feet. The missed blow threw Janna off her balance for a moment. Just a moment long enough for Lalah to take out her gun.

"Stop!" she spat, holding the gun hard in one hand.

Janna didn't. She kicked the gun out of her grip. It slid across the floor into the corner and Lalah turned around – loosing concentration and Janna slammed her fist into her jaw hard. Lalah fell to the floor, crying out.

"No," she gasped when Janna reached for the gun; she crawled up on all fours. "Don't. Never works. I always get you back, remember?"

Janna replied coolly, "Not this time. Not if I kill you."

Janna swirled around, gun in her hand, ready to fire when she was slammed back against the wall. The gun falling to the ground as Lalah held her in place.

"You haven't yelled for the guards," Janna said, a little out of breath, a little out of glee.

Lalah was so close to her face that her nose was almost touching hers. "If I do, it will be the last drop for them. I won't be able to protect you anymore."

"Is this what you call protecting?" Janna's lips ghosted over hers.

And she collapsed on the ground, twisting and turning from the taser in Lalah's hand.

Lalah tilted her head to the side, watched Janna's face get just a tint of red of the pain. "Yeah, definitely."

Janna's breath hitched, but it wasn't from the pain, it was from her laughter. It was beautiful and terrifying all at once. Just like she'd laughed the first time Lalah had put a gun to her forehead, swearing she would shoot. And Janna had just laughed and laughed until Lalah was thrown off her concentration so much that she –

Janna was up on her feet in less than a second. The gun in her hand pointing directly at Lalah's head.

"You didn't really think I cared, did you?" she said, out of breath.

"No."

Lalah kicked the gun out of her hands; Janna stared at her like she couldn't believe it. Lalah smirked and this time, when she tasered Janna, it was almost with full power.

Janna fell to the floor, unconscious but her body still shaking from the shock.

"I have always been better than you."

"It's all a part of her mental disorder," Felicity said, for the hundredth, millionth time when Lalah arrived outside her room with her wounds, "the violence…" With a bit of hesitation she added, "Her charm."

Lalah knew.

----

At the hall of the club _Fantasy_, she saw herself in the big, large mirror on the wall. She still had a faint bloodstain at the edge of her shirt. With a resigned sigh she tucked it into her jeans before entering.

She's caught glance of the club, its colorful sign breaking through her barrier of thoughts. It had been a warm night in Costa Rica, and she heard from the restaurants and bars the clicking of glass and talks and laughs heard. What had awaited Lalah at the end of the road was a small, dirty motel room. And she wouldn't have so much against it in usual cases, she'd gotten used to rooms like that now, but it was the thought of being alone.

It had been pure instinct that led her to the place. The oriental, quiet but yet mystical music in the background, the laughter, the people, everyone sitting together in groups around the tables reminded her of her own home.

Her family were scattered around the world at the moment. Her older brother somewhere in Scandinavia, her mother and father back in American and her sister had actually bought a temporary home in Australia. She missed them terribly. With her family, there had never ever been a quiet moment.

Except for when they worked, of course.

She could've sit down at any table in the room, ordered a drink, picked up a conversation, comfortable in the knowledge that she was half hidden in the shadows. But instead she sat down in one of the tables in the left corner, alone.

She'd just gotten her drink when she heard the sound of jewelry clattering. And the chair next to hers was pulled out.

Lalah turned her head and was caught in the gaze of the woman's eyes. She blinked; they were almost like the color of honey.

The woman was staring, her eyes big and her lips parted in surprise. She looked at Lalah like she was the thing she'd been waiting for her whole life.

"Um…" Lalah didn't often find herself speechless, but under the young woman's intense look (she looked a lot younger than her) she found that she could barely say a word.

The woman opened her mouth to speak, but instead she curled her lips up in a big, heartedly grin. "Can you please stay?"

Lalah blinked. It felt all her coolness and grace washing off her at those words.

"I... I really need to talk to you." She almost looked a bit shy at those words, but the big smile was still on her face. Her eyes glittered from the dim lights and Lalah found herself captivated by it.

"Yeah – yes," she finally mustered.

"Okay, I – I have to go now." She stood up from her chair, taking up a deep purple scarf from one of the pockets in her long skirt, wrapping it around her neck. "But, please don't leave. Stay."

Lalah nodded, not breaking eye contact with the young woman one second.

The woman's smile, if possible, grew even wider and she disappeared into the dark shadows of the club.

Lalah took a sip of her drink, wondering what the hell had just happened when the music pumped up.

The lights went out over the tables, and turned her eyes to the lit up scene, just like everyone else in the club had.

Out on the stage five women entered. Three of them were wearing long golden dresses, long red, green and blue necklaces wrapped around their necks and their skins were tinted with golden glitter, they moved their bodies slowly in the background as two of the women, both of them wearing purple scarves danced at the front.

Lalah smiled, and the crowd cheered, clearly enjoying the women's talent.

One of the women swung her curly, black hair back, and her eyes locked with Lalah's.

Eyes like honey.

When the show was done, the same woman showed up at her table again. She looked like she'd been in a rush, there were still some gold on her cheek and her hair was in a mess but she was smiling bright and happily.

"You got blood on you," she said in one breath. She gasped and covered her mouth with her hands. "I – I didn't mean – sorry. I just… your shirt – I was…"

"You must be good at seeing in the dark, yeah?" Lalah raised an eyebrow, smiling. "You're a good dancer. More than good, bloody amazing."

"Oh… no." She bowed her head a little, smiling shyly. "There are many better –"

"Not from where I was sitting."

They were silent for a while. And then the woman extended a hand, laughing childishly.

"I'm Aurora."

"Lucky to meet you, Rora," she said, shaking her hand. Even though Lalah knew that meeting her had absolutely nothing to do with luck, but it would take a long time for her to accept that. But Aurora would, in years to come teach her that there really was such a thing as fate.

----

Describing her father.

Claret didn't know him. She barely knew anything about him. But she remembered his ordinary face and especially the faint scar over his left eyebrow. She remembered that he had been caught – caught for murdering her grandmother. And she knew she'd seen him there, and that he'd simply ignored her.

She was trembling as she was telling Ben all of this. The curtains were drawn back, and she hated how the sunlight only fell upon her. She shifted uncomfortably in the chair, trying to turn her head to the shadows.

"Claret…" Ben said in his drawled out voice when she was done. "I swear to you that your father is not here."

She opened her mouth to protest but he continued:

"I wouldn't lie to you, Claret. You do know that. But… I wonder…" Ben looked away, but Claret stared at him, anxious for what he was going to say.

He turned to her again. "Maybe you panic attacks –"

"No. I know what I saw – you can't – I know."

"You think you know."

Claire furrowed her brow, looking curiously into his eyes. "What do you mean? I saw what I saw."

"Have you never seen something that looked so real to you, but you knew in your heart it was nothing but a hallucination… Claret, this island, this place is different. Sometimes… things that aren't there… are seen."

Claret swallowed. "The only time that happened to me was – was when I was chased through the jungle by the monster. And then I was very scared."

Ben's eyes narrowed. "The monster?"

And it was moments like these when Claret doubted herself. When Ben looked like he was trying too hard, too hard to be nice to her, to protect her from something she didn't even _know_. He had to know what she meant. Yet, he pretended he didn't.

"It's this – thing. It makes weird sounds and I… I have…"

"Claret," he put his hand over hers on the table, "have you seen it?"

"I have been chased by it twice. The first time was back when we just crashed, after you left me there at the cockpit. The second time was just before you took me –"

"Have you seen it?" he repeated angrily.

"I…" Claret looked down, drew her hand back. "I'm not sure. And it doesn't matter, what matters is that my father was here and –"

Ben stood up from his chair. "We don't have time for this."

"Don't have – hey!" she shouted, rising up to her feet too and followed after him to the door. "You promised."

Ben stared at her for a long moment. "Talk to Sawyer, and we'll have another conversation if you wish."

"He doesn't even want to leave!" she shouted.

"Convince him he got nothing worth staying for." He left.

Claret hadn't even said good luck to him about the surgery.

----

"Señora! Disculpa me, por favor. Señora! Necesito ayuda!"

Lalah looked around the store in confusion until she saw a man and Aurora stand by the spell kits. There was no laughter, no words, no jingle of jewelry coming from Aurora, just shouting from the man.

She hurried over there, placing a hand on the man's shoulder. "Excuse me!" She knew enough Spanish to know he'd been asking for help.

The man turned around, his eyes big and bewildered. "La Señora es –"

"No Spanish," Lalah explained, she glanced over his shoulder at Aurora who was standing still as a statue. "What do you want help with? Do you want a spell kit?"

The man suddenly smiled. "Ah, English, so you're from the States?"

"You too, I guess." Lalah worriedly glanced at Aurora again.

The man frowned again. "That woman over there, is there something wrong with her? Suddenly she just got still and ignored me. Any screw loose or something? You're not like her are you? Or is it something in the job description?"

Lalah turned to him again. "My job," she said in sudden coolness, "is to kill son of a bitches like you."

"You know what?" He threw his hands up. "My daughter could do better off without the Rosary." He muttered to himself until the door slammed shut behind him, the clocks and small pendulums next to it swinging back and forth, almost falling.

In less than a second Lalah was at Aurora's side. She took her hands. "Rora, love… you there?" she whispered a bit pathetically.

Aurora blinked, her beautiful eyes becoming honey again and she grinned widely. "Lalah!" She threw her arms around her, pulling back almost immediately. "So glad you are here." She frowned, looking around. "Where is my costumer?"

"He left," Lalah said slowly, Aurora was already walking away to the behind counter, beginning to grind the herbs she'd been working on before. She wasn't wearing any shoes. "Rora…"

"You got your worried voice," Aurora said without looking up. "So he left, if that was what he wanted I'm not sad."

Lalah frowned. "You were just… still."

"That's happened before, there's no need to worry."

"You weren't aware any time had passed –"

"I'm fine, my Star." Aurora looked up, smiling again and she bent forward to kiss Lalah quickly over the counter. "It's always different. Sometimes it happens quickly, like a blink of an eye, and sometimes I become like a marble statue."

Lalah said slowly, "And sometimes you see the future."

Aurora sighed. "I always see it."

Lalah crossed her arms. "You know what I'm gonna do next?"

"Lalah, please have faith in me."

"I do –"

"Then why is it so hard to believe? If you have faith in me, you should have faith in my power, because it's a part of me."

"I can't!" Lalah groaned in frustration. "I could but now – you saw us – you saw yourself in a white dress. A ring. Our families gathered together. Us saying: 'I do.'"

Aurora shrunk back, and her yes got big and sad. "Why is that so horrible?"

And Lalah hated seeing her like that, puppy-dog eyes and looking so small and so young, like she was. It was just so easy to forget sometimes with Aurora, with her maturity, with everything she'd been through. But Lalah thought sometimes, with guilt like it was forbidden that Aurora was just too damn young to have that kind of power on your shoulders. And she knew there were more like her, younger people, older, and yet she still thought that. She couldn't help it.

But she had faith in her, always would.

"'Cause," Lalah said, trying desperately to smile, "there's this thing called surprise."

From her pocket she picked up an engagement ring.

----

"This time we'll make sure you won't do the same thing again," Diane assured him, looking expressionless as always through the thick glass.

"Oh yeah?" Jack answered. He smiled; he'd been acting far more carefree since he knew that Lori was away. He stood up from the table. "Care to tell me how?"

Diane blinked. "An eye for an eye, Shephard. We still have your friends."

Jack chuckled. "If you want them dead so badly why don't you just do it?"

Diane opened her mouth to speak, but the door on her side opened and she turned around, slowly as always, like she expected the whole world to wait for her if she told it to.

"What are you doing?" Ben snapped. He took a step inside the room, Jack stared at him, stumbling back, but Ben wasn't talking to him.

Diane blinked again, twice, before she answered, "Telling him about the surgery."

"There will be none tonight."

At that Jack cleared his throat, getting their attention. "Your neck, does it hurt? Any numbness in your fingers and toes, like pins and needles when your foot falls asleep, but permanent? You should've had the surgery yesterday. The tumor on your spine, it's aggressive."

"It doesn't matter; reschedule the surgery in two days, Diane."

Diane looked from Jack and then to Ben who went out the door. She followed after him with long steps, leaving the door open.

"This is not –" Was all he could hear before one of the guards shut the door.

--

Flor shrunk back against the bars, as far away from the man standing outside she could. He was the one who'd left the bruises on her body.

He was for the moment just staring, walking back and forth outside. She didn't know if he had the keys, she didn't know what he wanted.

"It's tomorrow!" she suddenly screamed. Ivan halted, eyes widening slightly. "They're gonna kill me tomorrow! Justice finally served, right?"

"They're not gonna be able to kill you," he drawled.

Flor became silent; she saw something glimmer in his hand – the keys.

He muttered bitterly, "'Cause whatever the bloody hell happened, happened."

"What?"

"Ivan!" someone barked. Flor saw a beautiful woman, deep brown skin and braided hair, come going towards them. She glared at Ivan, and Flor saw that she had a gun in a holster. "Leave! You're not supposed to be here, yeah? She'll get what's comin' for her tomorrow."

Ivan scowled, began to walk away. "You better have a good aim, Lalah!" he shouted.

The woman stayed until he left, then she walked up to Flor's cage.

"I don't bite," she said. Flor took a careful step forward.

"What do you want?"

"A lot," Lalah answered. "Nothing you can give me, Florence. I'm here to tell you some things, 'cause apparently Ben thinks it's more 'human' to tell you exactly how you're gonna bite the dust. First off, you're not gonna see anything as you die. You'll be blindfolded, sort of. We're gonna bring you to this room in the deepest levels of this whole station, me and two others. The room will be empty, and you better have to start thinkin' about your famous last words. I'm the only one with the gun, and don't worry." She winked. "I have a very good aim."

----

Lalah had just come home from work, taking off her shirt when Aurora rushed into the hall, despite it being in the middle of the night. Even through the dark, Lalah could see a big, but worried grin on her face.

"We're going away!" She hugged Lalah, pulling back quickly as always. "I have felt it for a long time, but I had a vision, and now I know it! Finalmente!" She furrowed her brow, looking up and down Lalah's body. "Are you hurt?"

Lalah would've snapped back at that, still in what Aurora called 'her work personality' but she knew that Aurora's visions were important. "What do you mean we're going away?"

"We're going to an island. A man will come to us, dark hair, light skin – he speaks Spanish but English too and he has this eyelashes – and he will take us there. This is the next step in our life together."

"Okay, slow down." Lalah hadn't even taken off her shoes yet, and as Aurora got silent she took them off. "Begin at the beginning."

----

"I ain't leaving without Eva," Sawyer growled, straining against the binds, wanting to reach out and put his hands around Claret's throat.

Claret noticed that and she blinked, cleared her throat and looked down. "We are giving you the opportunity –"

"Oh, quit the damn salesman act, Shaky. You sound like their puppet," Sawyer snapped. "Tell me what you really want from me; because you sure as hell ain't just gonna let me go."

"We are –"

"I said quit it."

Claret pressed her lips together, glaring. "Why do you fight it? There's nothing here to stay for. Nothing worth staying for."

"Why, I think the food here is just lovely, nothing beats it."

Claret tilted her head to the side, regaining some of her confident posture. "We want you to leave."

"Then why don't you just bind me up – oh," he raised his eyebrows in pretend surprise, "already done that – and throw me in a yellow submarine?"

"Because we want you to want to leave."

Sawyer scoffed. "Since when do you care what the hell I want? And what is this, a therapy session?"

Claret sighed deeply. "You are so annoying," she muttered under her breath, a little louder she said, "I don't have time for this. You get three days to decide."

"What happens if I decide to stay?" he shouted after her.

Claret's feet were aching, but she just kept on walking as she stepped out of the building. She crossed her arms, almost hugging herself as she in a fast pace crossed the grass into the small path through the jungle.

Sawyer had called her _a puppet._ And even though she tried to deny it, thinking back from the first day of the crash to now, they'd been controlling her.

Ben had showed up, a savior at first, rescue – and then, nothing and after that absolutely everything. She'd endured torture for them – for him. But Sayid, as he screamed at her, hurt her, had still not been right. She wasn't one of them. She didn't belong with _them._

A blonde woman walked past her, throwing her a suspicious look, there was a gun in her holster and Claret wished she could just shrink into nothing under that gaze.

None of them trusted her. None of them wanted her there but Ben.

She wasn't still sure why.

She heard a twig snap, and voices, through the trees she saw the twins, and with them Sean. She hurried over to them, as she got closer she could see a bruise, blue and red skin around Sean's right eye.

"What's going on?" she asked.

Sean gave her a poisonous look. She bit her lip and reminded herself that he couldn't hurt her. The twins had guns and tasers and they would protect her.

At least he hoped they would.

"Why isn't he in his cage, or working? Where are you taking him?"

The twins exchanged a look, deciding whether they should even answer her.

She stomped her foot on the ground, childishly, but she regained their attention that way.

"We're taking him someplace else," one of them answered, muttering, but a smirk played on his lips.

Claret shook her head. "No you aren't."

The other one laughed. "Sweetheart, you got no authority over us."

"He's going back to the cages. Ben said so."

The both laughed now, and the left one raised one eyebrow. "Oh, so great big ol' Ben said so."

"Yes he did," Claret confirmed, trying to look far surer than she felt. "He's going back to Florence. It's her last day, she should be allowed to say goodbye."

Sean looked at her now, Claret tried to avoid it, but she met his eyes. He was trying to say something, or maybe he was trying to threaten her. She wasn't sure.

Claret wanted to tell him that she was sorry.

"You have no power over us," the left one snarled.

Claret turned around.

"But I do." Ben had arrived soundlessly. Even the twins looked a little freaked out, but Sean looked like he'd seen him coming from far away. Claret wondered what he was doing here, but Ben always seemed to be at the right place at the right time.

"Do as she says."

The twins scowled at Ben, but dragged Sean away with them. Sean wasn't fighting against them anymore.

----

"That's him!" Aurora left Lalah's side in a second despite the fact that the show was about to start at any moment. The lights had already gone darker, and Lalah saw one of the dancers, a woman named Sylvia walk form the back of the stage to get Aurora.

Lalah hurried up to her, and Sylvia stopped in her tracks, studying her with that eerie look all of them seemed to have, except for Aurora who always looked at her like she was the sun.

"Pues, we'll start without her," Sylvia sighed, without Lalah having said one thing.

Lalah turned around, and saw a tall man, dark hair, light skin, it was hard to see more through the dim lights but he was looking at Aurora with a stoic face. And Lalah was surprised he wasn't looking at her with a huge smile, or looking at her like she was crazy like most people did when they met Aurora for the first time.

It was almost like they already knew each other.

As Lalah moved closer, she could hear them speak over the music.

"… I have heard of your power, not that I've seen it, I know it's true."

Aurora beamed.

"What's going on?" Lalah asked, her tone a bit too snappish than she'd intended when she reached them.

Aurora took her hand immediately. "This is him. He's the one who'll bring us to the island. I told you, and now he's here."

"Us?" the man said. "No, I only meant you, Aurora."

Sometimes, it was easy to forget that Aurora had something beyond anything Lalah could imagine, but in that moment, as soon as those words left the man's lips Lalah was surprised that he didn't immediately run for the door, that no one saw the power practically radiating from her.

"You said you have heard of my power," Aurora whispered, but somehow her voice was stronger than before, "I saw my wife and me there on that island. And there is absolutely no way I will come with you without Lalah."

The man looked from her to Lalah. "We have a lot to discuss," he said.

Aurora nodded slowly. "Yes we do, Richardus, isn't it?"

The man finally looked surprised.

----

Sean had in the end, tried.

Tried miserably.

Failing.

He knew it wouldn't work. As he got the gun off one of the twins, pointing it at his head, threatening to shoot him if they didn't release Florence. He hadn't even dared to hope.

But he wouldn't be able – he had to at least have _tried._

When they arrived at the caves, Flor was sitting on the ground, fish biscuits scattered around her, some broken in half. When she saw them, she stood up on her feet, running up to the bars.

"What the hell did you do to him?" she yelled.

The twins, still put off by Claret giving them orders, just muttered some things not even Sean would like to repeat. One of them let go of his arm (he could feel the bruises start to form where his fingers had dug in) and opened the door, not to his cage but to Flor's.

Flor looked just as confused as he felt, but neither of them protested or asked any more questions as the twins locked the door and left.

They stared at each other. And then Flor threw her arms around him, hugging him hard. He was shocked for a second, and then he wrapped his arms around her too.

"It's tomorrow," she whispered. "They say they're gonna do it tomorrow. Claret said that, she – she – they asked about what I believed and – it's gonna happen. I can't believe it. I can't believe I'm going to die."

--

Claret closed the door to her room, resting her head against the frame. She inhaled deeply, and then exhaled slowly. What had she gotten herself into? Sawyer. Flor. Ben.

She stepped back from the door, going to the large windows, the sun was going down, and she drew the curtains closed.

She'd seen her father. The crazy man her grandpa had said meant nothing.

But it did, it meant everything.

When she turned around, she saw that a bundle of paper on the floor, just at the door that hadn't been there before. Frowning, she looked out from the room but there was no one in the corridor.

Curiously she took up the documents; she sat down at the table, flipping through them. Her own name was written at the top.

It was her whole life.

It was written just like Sawyer's folder, and it was about her. But who had given t to her? Why hadn't Ben showed her this?

Her mother's name caught her eye, and she felt tears well up in her eyes.

_José Gonzales._

She gaped, blinking and staring at the page she held in her hands.

He wasn't her father.

She asked out loud to herself, feeling her throat choke up, "Who… who is Anthony Cooper?"

----

"Maybe this Richardo-y guy –"

"It's Richardus or Richard as he calls himself now," Aurora chirped, adjusting one of the deep purple dreamcatchers hanging in the low roof. "Will you help me unload this box? It contains very exotic mixtures; this nice old lady from Japan gave them to us for free. Apparently her daughter was very pleased with _Aurora's Place_."

Lalah opened it up. She crinkled her nose at the odor coming from the content. "Maybe he just, isn't, you know, that guy you saw –"

"It was him," Aurora said quickly, no hesitation and no doubt. "He will be back. Both of us will go to that island."

Lalah sighed. "Maybe it was a different island."

Aurora arched one eyebrow, staring at her.

"Okay, maybe not."

The door jingled, and Aurora clapped her hands together, looking very cute and far too innocent as she did so. As usual, Lalah couldn't help but feel overprotective of her even though Aurora didn't need it.

"Nice store." It was the Richard guy. Lalah studied him with narrow eyes. He had a casual blue shirt on, nothing that looked like weapons but she knew that there were many places you could hide such things.

"Thank you," Aurora answered. "This place is built on very positive energy."

The guy nodded like he knew exactly what she was talking about. Lalah snorted, earning a weird look from both of them, like she was the crazy of the three of them.

"Have you been thinking about my offer?" Richard said, aimed at Aurora.

Aurora nodded. "Yes, and the answer is the same as before. I won't come with you without Lalah."

"Good, and you don't have to either." He turned to Lalah, smiling, she returned it warily. "You are welcome to come with us. We're leaving at the end of the week."

"Well," Lalah said, seeing the big grin on Aurora's face. "We better start packing then, yeah?"

----

The gun was loaded; Addie nodded to Lalah and together with Ivan in tow – he wanted to see that it really happened they set off to Florence Bluth's cage.

Lalah looked up at the sky outside, the air was humid, but above she could see storms clouding for a storm. Then she concentrated at the task at hand.

O'Donnell and Bluth were lying together in her cage. The man saw her, eyes widening.

"Flor!" he yelled. But the warning was useless, there was nothing the girl could do to get away.

She protested weakly, the man held onto her tighter but Addie was harsh, stronger. They all just wanted it to be over quick.

A gun was pressed into his head and he let her go, losing his concentration for just a second.

Lalah pulled the hood over the Florence's head.

"DON'T!" O'Donnell's death threats were now getting mixed with words like _no_ and _please._ They were all deaf to his pleadings.

They led her back into the building, and she started to beg. "No," she whimpered and Lalah held her arm tighter in case she would foolishly try to escape. "Please, no, haven't done anything, haven't done anything."

They led her down the stairs.

----

Lalah woke up with a start, immediately wrapping her arms around her wife. Aurora was shaking, sitting right up on the bed, mumbling, whispering and Lalah tried to get her to lie down but Aurora was stubborn.

"Rora, Rora," Lalah repeated, dragging at her arms. "Rora look at me." She tried to turn her head, but Aurora's eyes were closed, her lips still forming an endless stream of words Lalah couldn't understand. And she was saying them faster, her body shaking even more –

"Aurora!" Lalah yelled.

They had been on the island for four years, and during that time Aurora had embraced her improved power. 'Learned from the island' as she said with a smile, but Lalah knew she was incredibly serious. And yes, the visions had become more and more, but they were also constant, not just flaring up at any second any day.

At least, it had been that way for several years.

"She has a light fever, nothing more," Juliet informed Lalah. Aurora was sleeping in one of the infirmary's beds. "But I still think you should speak to Richard."

"I will," Lalah replied, throwing worried looks at her wife's peaceful form, "once he returns."

Juliet nodded and turned around.

"What about Ben?"

Juliet whirled around again. "He wants to talk to Aurora when she wakes up, only her."

"Okay."

"Hey," Juliet smiled faintly and touched her arm in comfort, "she's going to be fine."

Juliet was wrong.

Two days later Aurora woke up screaming, Lalah was in tears, trying to get her to stop but she wouldn't. She didn't go to get help, didn't go anywhere just stayed, clinging onto Aurora until she got silent.

Too silent.

Lalah pulled back in horror, and Aurora fell limply back against the mattress.

"Ro – Rora?" she whispered weakly.

Aurora's eyes fluttered open.

"Oh thank –"

"They're coming." It didn't sound like Aurora's voice.

"What?"

It was too free from emotion, no happiness, no sadness just monotone. "They're coming."

"I – I don't know," Lalah said as Aurora, shaking, screaming again was back at the infirmary. "She just – it's like she's in a trance – I don't –"

The door opened behind them and Ben came in.

Lalah ignored Juliet, ignored her wife's agony and crossed the room fast, closing her fist. "YOU!" she screamed. "You did this! With all your tests – experiments – you –"

Ben completely ignored her, stepping aside and walking past her towards her wife.

Lalah was just about to pull up the gun from her holster when a hand was out over hers, stopping her. "Calm down, love. Before you do somethin' you'll regret. Your wife needs ya."

Lalah nodded and Vincent smiled.

She returned to Aurora's side, she was trembling with the fever but she'd stopped screaming, but she was still trying to speak.

"Aurora," Ben said before Lalah could sooth her with kind words, "I need you to tell me what you're seeing."

Lalah stared at Ben with surprise.

Aurora shook her head. "No – no –"

"Aurora. This is important."

"Ben," Juliet said stressed, "step aside she needs –"

"No," Ben replied. "Aurora, tell me."

Aurora closed her eyes hard, tightening her fingers around Lalah's hand, almost to the point of pain.

"It's all gonna end," she sobbed. "They're coming and it will all be over. Flor – Florence Bluth she will –"

"Who's Florence Bluth?" Lalah asked.

"Bad… They're gonna – she's gonna… no… no… kill her. Kill her."

Ben said, "Aurora –"

"NO!" Aurora screamed, and she just continued. Lalah covered her ears, breaking down and Ben just stared.

----

Lalah pushed Florence inside the room, she stumbled a little. Addie forced her down on her knees and her begging became more frantic. "No, no, no, it's not my destiny... I'm not supposed to... _please._ I beg you – please, not now – you said – please."

Lalah pulled out her gun.

"Ivan, stand outside the door," she whispered. Ivan looked like he was gonna argue but he didn't.

"Safety released?" Addie said.

Lalah nodded, pressing the gun to Florence's temple.

-----

"They're sending me away," Aurora whispered, holding the cup of tea in her hands. She was sitting with her knees drawn up to her chest on the chair, Lalah sitting beside her.

Lalah wasn't used to crying so much. But when Aurora was in pain – it just felt like she was going to crumble into a thousand pieces. Aurora blinked away a tear, but another one slipped through and fell down her cheek. Lalah wiped it away with her finger.

"You – you aren't even protesting." Aurora looked at her, all puppy-dog eyes, but now with something so much more broken there.

"The group at the temple will help you, and that's all I care about."

"But…" Aurora looked down, another tear falling. "But you won't be there."

"We can still send messages, yeah?" Lalah smiled, her bottom lip shivering. "Though Niles I mean, and it's not like you're gonna be gone for a year or anything."

"What if I am?" she whispered. "What if they can't fix me?"

Lalah leaned forward, almost kissing her, pressing their foreheads together. "Then we'll be broken together."

"I love you so much." More tears fell down Aurora's face and Lalah wrapped her arms around her.

"Yeah, me too."

Aurora started to sob. "You have to end it. Lalah. Promise me. Promise me you'll make it stop. You're the only one… will be the only one. Promise me. Please, Lalah. If you love me please do it."

Lalah had no idea what she was talking about. But Aurora was sobbing into her shoulder, so fragile, clinging onto her and begging. Her heart broke in pieces every time she saw Aurora's face when she was sad. And she was somewhat, happy that she wasn't looking into her eyes now. Because that would only make it harder for her to speak, and she had a feeling, an instinct that she was going to regret her words in the future.

She pressed a kiss against Aurora's temple.

"I promise."

----

Flor gave one final plead, "Please."

The shot echoed around the room.

Screams, yells, (YOU – DON'T!), more gunshots and then only silence.

The hood was pulled off her head. Flor blinked, realizing that she was alive. She was breathing hard, her whole body trembling. She felt something wet sink through the material of her shoes.

She knew without looking that it was blood.

And then she looked into the eyes of the person in front of her.

"You…" she whispered, staring with wide shocked eyes.

Janna held a gun and a taser in each hand. Her dark hair hung freely around her shoulder, contrasting against the white of her skin and the red blood on her thin shirt, making her look more like a death angel than a savior. "Get up on your feet, Bluth. We're getting the hell out of this place."

--

**Author's Notes:** Sorry for the late chapter. But now I got Easter break, and the exhibition is FINALLY over and I can sleep once again, yay! I like sleeping.

Thank you all for your awesome reviews! I love getting them.

This chapter introduced **Aurora Smith-Lee** submitted by DiorNicole.

Happy Easter! Or Holiday! I have no idea.

Namaste.


	40. I Am Happy Now

The ring is on my hand,  
And the wreath is on my brow;  
Satin and jewels grand  
Are all at my command,  
And I am happy now.

_And my lord he loves me well;  
But, when first he breathed his vow,  
I felt my bosom swell-  
For the words rang as a knell,  
And the voice seemed his who fell  
In the battle down the dell,  
And who is happy now._

_Lest an evil step be taken,-  
Lest the dead who is forsaken  
May not be happy now._

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 33, I Am Happy Now**

--

She decided to call it day one, even though she had been there for so much longer.

Claire stood up when she heard steps coming down the corridor outside their prison. She heard Brian, or maybe it was Boone, speak, and the clanking as their door was open and then the steps came their way.

"Finally," Lalita said behind her, "I'm starving."

A tall, lean man held out a crinkled paper bag through the bars. His eyes were sharp, watching her as Claire refused to accept it.

"It's not poisonous, Claire." Lalita grabbed the paper bag from him. "Thanks, Niles."

The man said nothing, but continued to watch Claire through his pale green-blue hooded eyes as he walked away from them.

"Sandwiches, and two bottles of water. Good." There was no sarcasm in her voice, and she actually smiled, handing Claire one of the sandwiches. She sat down on the floor, folding the package open. "So, tell me," she took a bite, "is Rosie really fine?"

Claire nodded slowly, studying her own piece of bread carefully. "Last time I saw her, yes. I just…" She looked up at Lalita."I had no idea you were here."

Lalita chuckled. "I told her not to tell anyone, but Sawyer would know, of course, since he would have noticed I was gone. So, she was not… worrying too much about me?"

"I don't know," Claire answered honestly. She'd been too occupied with her son to think too much about other people's problems and she was ashamed of that. She wished she could tell Lalita more about her wife, but she didn't know anymore. At least she could take comfort in the fact that Rosalie was safe for the moment.

"Did you, did you see your daughter?" Claire asked warily. "What happened to you, really?"

"I was stupid enough to think they wouldn't see me coming, they did and they captured me. I haven't seen a trace of Eva at all. All they've done have been to keep me here in this cell."

"All this time?"

Lalita shrugged. "Sometimes they take me out for walks, but they stopped since I continued to try to escape. I have no idea why they even bother keeping me locked in if they aren't going to do a thing about it. Boone and Brian though, they take them out all the time to 'talk.' But a day… or a couple of days ago, time is… you lose track of it, Boone came back, looking like a bloody pulp. Every time I try to ask why, they tell us to shut up."

"Why do they want you?"

"I don't know, Claire." Lalita was looking at her with a strange expression, almost like blame. "Why did they want you?"

"They… they wanted me to become one of them. They… said that."

Lalita walked over to the bars. "Isn't that what they told you too, Brian?" she screamed. "That they wanted you to become one of them?"

"Yeah!" Claire heard Brian shout back.

"You got some water?" It was Boone's voice, Claire had not heard it for so long and it took her a moment to realize that.

"Yes!" Lalita shouted back. She grabbed one of the water bottles, stretching her hand out between the bars and then rolled it away. "You got it?"

"Yeah! Thanks!"

Lalita drew back with a content smile, and Claire realized this wasn't the first time she'd done it.

"What about Boone?" she asked. "How long has he been –" Her words turned into a loud scream when a piercing alarm went off around them. Claire covered her ears, biting her lip but Lalita looked almost unaffected, her mouth working and she was mumbling something, a countdown Claire realized when the alarm stopped and Lalita said, "Zero."

"What was that?" Claire panted, looking up at the roof in bewilderment.

"That's how they tell us to shut up, to change the subject. We have to be quiet now."

Claire wanted to ask so much more, but she did as she said and didn't say a single word. Her body was aching from running, and she was so, so tired. But she didn't know if it was night or day. But then the lamp out in the corridor was turned off.

Lalita silently offered her a blanket and the both of them curled up under it. Lalita quickly fell asleep, but Claire who remembered the nice bed back in the house had a harder time. Lalita had somehow taken over the whole blanket, and she wished there was something protecting her too.

She opened her eyes, squinting in the dark, almost seeing the baby blue eyes of her son in front of her.

She blinked and realized there was a pair of eyes in the dark, but they were greener. Claire sat up quickly, and saw that the guy from before – Niles – was standing outside their cell, silent.

"What are you…" Her voice trailed off when she saw that he was holding something in his hand. She stood up slowly, seeing that it was another blanket. "Thank you, Niles," she said when he handed it over to her. He began to walk away. "I don't suppose you could open the cell door too?" He didn't even flinch, or acknowledge that she'd said anything at all and he disappeared into the dark.

Claire wrapped the blanket around herself, and this time it was easier to fall asleep.

Day two began.

She woke up. Startled she sat up, blinking and trying to fight away the dizziness.

"Stand up," a man, she recognized him faintly, his Asian features, but couldn't place him was opening the cage door, "Littleton, come with me."

Lalita and Claire exchanged worried looks but Claire did as he said. She rose to her feet and followed him out in the corridor.

"I will spare you some breakfast!" Lalita shouted after her.

At the end of the corridor she saw Brian getting taken out from his cell by another guy, who even smiled at her, a gun in his other hand and the other in a tight grip around Brian's arm.

"Don't worry," Brian said to her in a whisper as they were led up the stairs, away from the monitors and up on the ground again. "We'll be okay."

Claire nodded. "I'm glad you're –" But she was led in another direction than him , and couldn't finish her sentence. She looked over her shoulder, but Brian and the other man had disappeared around the corner of another house.

"Where are we going?" she asked the Asian man. He scowled at her and she shut her mouth, afraid that he would hurt her. And then she remembered – it was him. It was the man on the floor that Maddy had knocked out.

She hoped Maddy was safe.

He pushed her up a couple of stairs, leading up to the small porch of one of the many yellow houses. He pressed the doorbell and Claire looked at him with slight surprise.

A tall, blonde woman opened the door, wearing a chaperon with pale red stripes. Her eyes widened at the sight of them but then she smiled warmly.

"Hey, Juliet," the man said.

"Hi. I can take over from her now, Kiyoshi."

Kiyoshi nodded, sending a glare Claire's way one last time before he hurriedly walked down the stairs.

"Come in, Claire," Juliet said, opening the door wider and Claire entered the house before her. It was bright, the sun flooding in through the windows and it looked like someone's home, hats were set up by a mirror, a book carelessly thrown on the sofa table, many pairs of shoes in a mess beside the rug in the hall.

"I had just finished, well, burning my cookies." Juliet laughed lightly. "I'm not the best cook, but I try. You want one?"

Claire followed her into the kitchen, Juliet held out a plate but Claire didn't take any of the, half-burned but still delicious-looking cookies.

"What am I doing here?"

Juliet took a deep breath, putting the plate back on the table. Her smile disappeared from her face and she was suddenly looking serious. "You are here because this is one of the few houses not under surveillance. And it means that we can talk freely without anyone listening in on us. Claire, I need your help."

--

There were new objects in front of him this time; he guessed they got tired of showing him the old ones. There was a worn-out book, its title faded to the point it was inexistent. There was a rusty knife, and a compass, but it wasn't his compass. It was almost the same, but the fact that D A wasn't written on it.

"Let me guess," Brian said darkly, "one of these items belongs to me already? Even though they don't. And you are still crazy, right?"

Garrett sighed deeply. At first, Brian had thought the man had the patience of a saint, but Brian had been known in his school times to drive the sweetest teacher to insanity, and now it looked like even good ol' Gary was getting irritated.

A slight frown appeared on Garret's face when he said, "Only you know."

Brian knew how this usually went, they would sit there for hours until he finally just picked something out of irritation, and Garrett would sigh in disappointment and Brian would know that he had failed their little test once again.

He had no idea what the point was. Why they were doing this to him. But he was getting so damn tired out of it.

"I pick the knife," he said, pointing at it.

"Are you sure?" Garrett asked slowly. The first time he'd asked that, he had sounded almost excited, eager for him to deny or confirm his decision. But now he knew that Brian was only playing with him.

"Yeah, totally sure."

As he was brought back to his cell earlier Boone wasn't there yet. He caught a glance of Claire by the cell far down in the corridor but nothing more. He should ask about Aaron, he wanted to know if the little kid was all right. But he didn't like to talk about something like that when he knew the guards were watching and listening in on them. So he settled with knowing she was alive, and as well as you could be when you were in prison.

There was still some water in the bottle, and he gulped down it slowly, but spared some in case Boone had gotten beaten again. As most of the time Boone came back from whatever place they were taking him too, he hadn't said anything of what they'd done. The Others were always listening in on them, but it was freaking him out not to know.

He lay back on the blanket, looking up at the roof. Boone had carved into the roof how many days he'd been there, but when Brian arrived he'd started to engrave it on the wall instead, saying he was a new beginning, that now that Brian was here too, everything would change.

Brian thought that with Claire, it would.

--

_Day three._

Claire had been back in her cell just for a little while, and then they'd taken her away again. And as she heard the Australian accent Lalita opened her eyes.

"Hey."

Lalita looked up and quickly got up to her feet when she saw Claire stand outside the cell, her hands entwined around two bars, two guards on either side of her.

"Are you waiting for an invitation to come in?" Lalita asked since none of them had even moved.

Claire inhaled shakily, gripping the bars tighter. "I have to say goodbye now," she said quickly, like that would make the impact of the words lesser.

"What do you mean goodbye? Claire, what is going on?" She looked from her to the two guards, narrowing her eyes. "What are they going to do to you?"

"Oh, no they aren't gonna do anything! I will just not stay in this cell anymore. And they let me say goodbye to you." Claire smiled faintly and blushed a little. "Please, don't… don't hate me," she whispered weakly at the end.

"Hate you?" Lalita took a step forward before she realized what Claire really was telling her. "No, Claire." She shook her head unconsciously. "Don't. Whatever they said to make you believe them – is a lie. Claire, they took you, they took you away from your son."

"No…" Claire swallowed. "No, you don't understand. They are not that bad. I understand now. " She was taking deep breaths, the words too much to bear. "I'm going to be okay. You too. They aren't bad people, I just misunderstood them. Please, Lita."

It was the mention of Lalita's wife's nickname for her that made her lose it. "DON'T!" She leaped forward, grabbed Claire's wrists through the bars in a crushing grip. "Yo don't know what they've done! You are the one who doesn't understand! Don't, Claire! Don't trust them!"

Claire was wincing in pain but it only made Lalita hold her even harder. She spat, "All they do is LIE!"

A guard decided he'd had enough and brought out his taser but Lalita was quicker, hitting it out of his hand, but then Claire's hand had gotten loose and she wriggled herself out of her grip.

"PLEASE!" Claire screamed, but she had no idea why she was begging.

"My wife isn't okay, is she?" Lalita wasn't crying, but her face was twisted in fury, every word spitting out of her mouth like poison. "YOU LIED, DIDN'T YOU? THEY KILLED HER! JUST LIKE THEY KILLED EVA!"

"NO!" Claire screamed again, tears running down her face as she took a step forward again. But one of the guards stopped her, opening the door.

Lalita darted forward but he was ready for her. She fell to the floor in spasms, yelling in agony at the shocks going through her.

Claire was almost hyperventilating, clutching at her own arms, a hug if it hadn't been for the deep red marks where she'd scratched her own skin. "I'm so sorry," Claire sobbed as the guards led her away, "I'm so so –"

"THEY LIE!" Lalita screamed behind her. "THEY WILL NEVER LET YOU SEE YOUR CHILD AGAIN, CLAIRE! CLAIRE!"

They reached the end of the corridor, and Claire glanced to her side as they went past Brian and Boone's cell. Only one of them was in there.

Brian was watching her with absolute disgust on his face. And she looked away.

--

Outside the dark was falling. Claire stood up from the chair and put on the lights, she stayed by the switch, staring at the lamps. It was of that sight Maddy walked in on, Claire simply standing there.

"How could you?" Maddy said, her words too low than she wanted them to be, but she was afraid that if she spoke any louder she would break down in tears.

Claire's eyes widened as she just noticed her. "You're not supposed to be here, Maddy," Claire said quietly. "Go!"

Maddy took a step forward. "I'm not going. Not until you explain some things to me."

"Maddy!" Claire hissed, looking around like she thought someone was listening in on them. "You have to leave!"

"Not until you answer my question! How could you? How could you, after all you – we had been through just trust these people again?"

"They told me about you," Claire said sadly, her desperation and horror gone when she tilted her head. "They explained a lot of things, how you always felt misplaced, how you never stopped being a rebellious teenager –"

"You do not understand a word I'm saying, Claire! I risked everything, I tried so hard to save you and your friend, what about your son?"

Claire closed her mouth, looking down at the floor. "My son…"

Maddy shook her head. "What are you doing Claire? What are you doing with them?"

"I'm doing what is right," Claire said slowly, sounding like she's been taught exactly what she was going to say, "what I'm meant to –"

"It's all a lie!" Maddy grabbed her arms and Claire flinched. "They are horrid people! They hurt, all the do is manipulate –"

Claire freed herself from her grip, taking several steps back, crossing her arms. Her eyes burned into Maddy's, and they were once again filled with anger. "Leave. Now."

Maddy stormed out of the house, not even bothering to close the door behind her. Some people that were still outside stared at her, whispering to each other about what they had just heard… what they pretended they heard.

She ran until she was at her house again. The door was open and she just flung herself inside, locking herself in from the world. She took deep, sharp breaths, looking around in the house.

It wasn't hers anymore. She had been thrown out and it was definitely not Karl's small living room. She took slow, deep breaths and tried to wipe away the tears that kept falling.

The door opened and someone stepped into the house behind her. She didn't bother to turn around; she already knew who it was.

She heard Garrett sigh deeply. He said solemnly, taking a careful step towards her, "You heard about Jim."

Maddy looked up at him, stunned, whispering, "What about Jim?"

--

It was day four.

Claire looked out the window. She smiled and hurried to put on her shoes, then walking gracefully out on the porch, her excitement just lingering under the surface.

She saw an old man throw her a very displeased look when she crossed the grass. He wasn't the only one who looked at her that way, but Claire ignored all the glares, even the few ones that were just friendly waves until she reached the park bench, and the hunched figure sitting on it.

"Hey," she said quickly, her word almost soundless when she sat down beside Niles. He was holding a notepad in his hand, worn around the edges.

"I know you know who I am." He hadn't looked up, not even as she continued to speak, "But it's only polite to introduce one correctly, right?"

She smiled wider and held out a hand. "Claire Littleton."

Niles looked up, his face expressionless as he shook her hand. Claire's smile faded a little when he didn't say anything. Then, he nodded to the notepad.

Claire leaned in, reading the words scribbled down.

_For now I am Niles Radcliffe._

"Oh." Claire blinked, bit her lip. "Um, I…" She saw Juliet walk down the small path and quickly stood up. She turned around to excuse herself to Niles, but his concentration was not laid on her, so she just walked away.

"Hey, Juliet," Claire said in a cheerful tone, and she saw out of the corner of her eye some of the Others stare at her and Juliet as they walked together. "Where are you going with that basket?"

"I'm going to deliver some of these delicious, very much burned cookies." Juliet smiled.

"Am, am I supposed to come along?" Claire asked in a lower voice, noticing that some were listening in on them.

"If you want to," Juliet simply said.

--

Allen was currently trying to memorize every title in the bookshelf when Claire and Juliet entered the house. There was not much to do when you weren't allowed to leave the house alone. They hadn't clearly said that he couldn't, but he knew what kind of people they were.

He turned around slowly, determined to remain calm and unreachable but then Claire was there. And she was at first glance looking fine, wearing clean clothes and looking like she'd actually had a good night's sleep. But then, when he moved closer, arms stretching out to hug her, he saw the short, curly hair and her eyes that flickered and the way she and Juliet stood next to each other. No threats, fear, yes, but not aimed at Juliet but at him.

He stopped dead in his tracks, eyes narrowing. "What's going on?" he asked slowly.

"I brought you some muffins," Juliet said, walking past him into the kitchen, leaving Claire and Allen alone, staring at each other. "They are a little burned around the edges, but Vince said they were good."

Claire blinked, startled and looked down. "Hey," she said quietly.

Allen sighed, walking away from her to join Juliet. She was placing the muffins on a plate, smiling when she saw him.

"You want one?"

"I don't like cookies."

Juliet raised an eyebrow, her smile getting colder. "I remember clearly that you used to love them."

Allen met her gaze. His voice was strained when he said, "The ones that aren't burned."

"Do you want one, Claire?"

Allen hadn't noticed that she'd followed him. Claire nodded slightly and sat down in one of the chairs, trying to meet Allen's gaze.

"I love them," Claire said, breaking the silence, "my mom used to make these chocolate ones all the time." She took one of the cookies, and was just about to take a bite when Allen said, almost mindlessly:

"I wonder who will do that for Aaron."

Claire dropped the muffin on the plate and stormed out of the room. He heard the door slam hard, and Juliet's eyes turned wide.

Allen might have smiled then, just a little as he took a bite out of the cookie Claire had left.

----

Allen put down the cookie on the plate. "I'm not hungry." And since when did she bake anyway? Every time she started to cook something it ended in a fire.

"Oh, okay." he could hear her take up the plate and leave. He furrowed his brows, staring down at the book intently, trying to ignore everything around him. But the words just didn't make sense in his mind, and suddenly all he could focus on was why Juliet took the plate away.

New York_,_ he thought in his mind. New York, just think of that. Think of what you're going to do there, succeed in. The future. Everything he'd hoped for was there.

Except, he thought when Juliet turned his head away from the book to kiss him, she wouldn't be there.

And he couldn't decide if he was happy, or heartbroken about that.

-----

It was now Maddy realized how lonely she was.

She always felt alone, that wasn't much change, but she had never been, truly, so hopelessly lonely that she just sat in the couch in Karl's – her living room, knees drawn up to her chest and crying her eyes out without anyone to go for comfort.

When she had been little, she had often come to Liz when she was sad. She thought that was what was expected of her, since Liz had been the one to hold her hand when she for the first time walked across that dock away from the submarine.

Later, when she had gotten a little older, she realized that the only one who could stop her crying was Garrett, and that Liz's words weren't actually supposed to comfort, but supposed to scorn, to make her stronger and it was with fear she shut up. But Garrett would let her cry about the smallest of things, let her crawl up in his arms and feel safe for once.

When she began to detest the both of them, she had made friends that felt somewhat the same as her about some of the things the Others did. They didn't think exactly as she did, didn't understand her thoughts exactly, but they were friends. Karl, Jim and –

_Jim. _

Her heart clenched painfully and she sobbed again. She tried to keep the tears in, taking deep breaths but just as soon as her thoughts went back to Jim, Jim hurt, she broke down again.

She heard the door open and furiously blinked back her tears, wondering why she hadn't locked it when Garrett came in through the narrow hallway.

His eyes locked with hers immediately, and he crossed the room quickly, reaching out with his hand, an old reflex telling him to put her hair back behind her ears and wipe away the tears.

But of course, he stopped. Let his hand fall to his side.

"I'm sorry. I believe he will be… okay."

Maddy smiled quickly at the use of 'okay'.

"Who… who shot him?"

Garrett sat down on the couch, far away, but close enough. "It was Kimika Yamazaki."

Maddy wrapped her arms around her knees, looking, but not seeing, at the floor. "What will happen to her?"

"I do not know. It hasn't been decided yet."

"It's slow," Maddy said.

She saw Garrett look at her confused out of the corner of her eye. "What?"

"It's slow when you decide things, when Ben orders, it's quick."

She knew how his eyes got darker at the mention of their leader.

"You are taking a long time deciding what we are going to do with the people away from the island."

Garret froze, she knew how his eyes became sorrowful but strangely cold. Yet, he said nothing.

"Since the sky turned white," Maddy said slowly and quiet, "I saw how your shoulders slumped. I saw how sad you got. I saw how you smiled less and less. I lived with you. I saw those things." She swallowed, taking a deep breath. "Liz is not coming back, is she?"

She finally looked at him, but this time it was he who was not meeting her eyes. "She leaves often, but never for this long, and never have you ever been like this before. Since time is… unimportant, irrelevant to you that must mean… This time is different."

"Time has never been unimportant, Madeline."

--

She thought it was day five, she wondered silently if she was going to lose count.

"Claire!"

Claire looked up from the book she was reading, a cup of tea in her other hand. She'd been awake for hours, but it was only now the sun was starting to come up on the sky. She was still slightly freaked out from her nightmare and with Juliet running in, face flushed, it was a wonder she didn't spill all the hot tea over herself.

She took a second to pull herself together and carefully put the cup back on the table. "Juliet, what is it?"

Juliet said in one breath, "He's tried to escape."

Claire's eyes widened.

--

Allen's lip was bloody and his eye bruised. He wasn't much of a fighter, but the adrenaline had kicked in and all he had in his mind was to get away from there, flee. And not any weapon in the world could stop him. Except for fists, if fists counted when they smashed into one's face.

With a broken sigh he drank a little from the glass of water. Looking down because he didn't have the strength to look up. He knew the two guards were watching him, and their gazes burned into him. But at the moment he just didn't have the strength to care.

_I'm so sorry, Ellie, _he 'd failed her again.

He slowly turned his eyes up to the surveillance camera above the bookshelf.

"I want to talk to him, alone, please."

"Juliet –"

"Let her talk to him."

The voices were coming from the hall, and he saw out of the corner of his eye that the guards left.

"Hello Juliet, Claire." Allen still didn't look at them.

"I'll leave you two alone," Juliet said in her calm tone and he heard her close the door behind her.

That left him alone with Claire.

As soon as the door was shut Claire hurried over to his side, inspecting his face, the injuries. "Are you okay?"

Allen smirked, and he said what he knew a certain Southerner would say in his situation, "You should see the other guy."

She sighed. "Why would you try to escape, Allen? Why"

"Because I care about _my_ child."

Claire flinched away from him, taking a sharp breath. "They wouldn't have hurt you if you hadn't hurt them."

"Why do you defend them?"

"Because!" Claire shouted. "They aren't bad people. I am happy now. Haven't Juliet told you? They will let us see our children again. If we choose to, we can bring them here! To running water, warm beds, have you seen the playground?"

"We don't have a choice, Claire."

"Yes!" Claire kneeled in front of him, clinging onto his arms, making him look at her. "Yes we do! If you just… stop… everything is going to be okay." She let go of him. "Juliet… told me about you. You knew her before, right? So, the old Juliet you knew. She wouldn't hurt you? Would she?"

Allen was silent, looking down too.

"Right?"

----

Allen knew when Juliet disagreed on something. She never told him so, no. She just pursed her lips, looked away or stared with that cold look in her eyes and she would be silently furious at him and he would have no idea what he had done since she refused to acknowledge it.

It was enough to drive one crazy.

So when he mentioned that he'd like to leave for New York to study, and she mentioned that she would like to stay with her sister who was sick, there was a silent agreement between them that that was the last time they talked about it. Their relationship was doomed from that point, they both knew they would split up; they just… didn't acknowledge it.

It was Rachel, Juliet's sick sister who somehow in her despair and ghostly pale face managed to smile and glower, who got tired of it first. She was lying in her bed in her own flat; they couldn't afford to have her in the hospital all the time, when she'd ordered Allen to get her a glass of water.

He could still hear what she was saying.

"So he's leaving?" came Rachel's voice from the other room as Allen filled the glass with water.

"I'm… I'm not sure," Juliet answered, tired.

"How can you not be sure?"

"We don't… we don't really talk about it."

"Julie! Are you afraid of him? Has he –"

"No, no. It's all right. I just don't want to discuss it."

Silence. And Allen decided to return to the room, a false smile plastered on his face.

"I brought back some –"

"Are you going to New York?" Rachel asked quickly.

"Uh…"

"Simple question."

Juliet blushed, looking down. "Rachel –"

"I just asked a question."

Allen cleared his throat, glanced Juliet's way and his voice was surprisingly strong when he said, "Yes. I am."

"And there you have it." Rachel yawned.

----

Boone hadn't come back for days.

Brian was pacing back and forth in his cell, throwing angry glares at the surveillance camera in the corner. They had brought even less food over the past few days. And Lalita had shouted something about them making him 'used to eat little', to make him weaker but still strong enough not to get sick. He wondered if Boone, wherever he was, was getting almost nothing to eat him too.

_What if Boone escaped?_

He froze in his tracks, the revelation of the thought hitting him. None of them had spoken much about it, in fear that the Others were listening, but what if he had?

He didn't know for sure if the thought made him furious or glad.

The door opened, and he heard Lalita yell the word 'food'. One of the guards came in, and beside him was…

"Boone!" His bruises weren't exactly healed, but he looked like he'd at least have more than one meal a day.

The guard opened the door and shoved him in, before leaving with a displeased grunt.

Brian immediately hugged his friend longer than necessary, but Boone wasn't dead… and he hadn't escaped without Brian.

"Where've you been, man?" Brian asked, grinning when Boone pulled away with a grimace.

Boone nodded to the surveillance camera and Brian understood.

"What's going on?" Lalita shouted from her cell further down her corridor.

"I'm back!" Boone shouted back, the first words he'd uttered since returning. Yeah, he sounded all right.

"Did you see Claire?" Lalita yelled.

"No!" He turned to Brian and in a lower voice he asked, "What's with Claire?"

"She's with them," Brian said simply, trying to hold in his anger. But his tone was strained and he just wanted to lash out at something, anything in fury.

"Them? Claire?" Boone asked, disbelieving. "No, she wouldn't –"

"But she has."

There was a tense moment between them. And Boone sat down in one of the corners, leaning his head on the wall.

"You were gone for days." It wasn't a question, it was a statement. And Brian didn't know why he felt so betrayed.

"I know," he answered.

--

"Would you like to take a walk?" Juliet had asked gently, the guards had left and it was only the two of them in the house. And whoever was watching them through the camera.

Allen looked out the window; the lampposts were lit, shedding some light in the dark of the night. He nodded, not saying a word, and followed her out.

It felt all too familiar, reminded him of long walks by the beach in Miami, shy smiles and that fuzzy feeling he used to get whenever he was around her.

Juliet sighed, crossing her arms as they walked on the small path. "You shouldn't have tried to escape."

"Why?"

A smile played on her lips, and she said slowly, "You are much more handsome without bruises, some men look good in scars, you aren't really… one of them."

"Claire told me some things," Allen said, ignoring what she'd said. "She said that you were planning on bringing our children here."

"Yes."

Allen blinked. "Are you? Are you going to kidnap them?"

"No, Al." Juliet shook her head, her smile turning sad. "We are not. We're only bringing them here with your consent."

"Consent? Do you people believe I am going to let you kidnap –"

"There is that word again," Juliet sighed again. "We want to bring Ellie here, but only if you let us. We will bring her here, reunite the two of you, and let you stay here – with us. We won't hurt you, all we want is to make a better life for you and your daughter."

Allen stopped. "Do you expect me to believe that?"

"Yes, Allen, I do expect you believe that! We have only hurt you when you have tried to harm us, and don't you want your daughter to grow up in a real house? A real home?"

Allen was silent for a moment, staring into Juliet's eyes.

"We already have a real home," he said.

----

Allen zipped up the bag, the last one. I was sad, how the apartment he and Juliet shared, has bought together after graduation looked almost the same even with his things gone.

Juliet was sitting on a chair by their small, rackety table. She hadn't said one word. She was fingering on a bracelet Rachel had given her, after saying her arms were too thin for it now.

Allen cleared his throat. He took up the bag so he would have somewhere to keep his hands. He stared at Juliet, but she kept looking down.

"So…"

Juliet bit her lip, still didn't say anything.

"Goodbye." That was it, no promise to call or to visit, no hug and no wave. It wasn't a real farewell, but it was all he could do.

He closed the door behind him, wondering how they could leave each other without any emotion, how she hadn't even shed a tear.

Inside, Juliet buried her face in her hands and sobbed.

----

Six days, only it hadn't been six days, it had been more. Ten days perhaps, Claire was afraid, she was afraid for Aaron. He needed her.

She needed him.

--

Allen was once again, pretending to read the book. The surveillance camera above the bookshelf was obvious, but who knew how many more there were hidden?

As a journalist, he always expected to say what he wanted, write what he wanted. He knew where writing was a dangerous thing, where every word was censored and where every step was being watched.

This felt a lot like it. Like he wasn't allowed to take a step outside the door, to simply read a book or just simply eat. The fact that there was someone on the other side watching made him feel exposed.

So he was pretending to read the book.

Reading was innocent enough.

There was a knock on the door and he ignored it. Figuring that whoever it was would enter anyway.

There was another knock on the door, the doorbell rang and the knocking continued until Allen couldn't stand it anymore. He opened the door, gritting his teeth.

"Who –"

"Hey!" Claire smiled shyly. Strands of blonde hair was hanging around her face, she'd tried to pull her short hair up in a ponytail but failed miserably. "Can I come in?"

Allen sighed, thinking of what Juliet had said the other night. "All right." He even smiled a little as she stepped into the house, and she beamed.

"I know it's day and all, but I thought maybe we could watch a movie?" Claire walked before him into his living room; kneeling in front of the television he hadn't bothered watching.

"Claire, I don't really –"

"It's just a movie. Not even a very good one. We could just talk."

"I really don't want to watch a movie."

"We can watch without sound then." She put the tape in, grabbing the remote control.

"As I said it's just a movie. Come on. You don't even have to watch."

With a sigh, Allen sat down on the couch. Claire was still standing next to the TV and she pressed play. Static showed on the screen.

"Allen," Claire said gently, "I want to say I'm sorry. I'm sorry for pushing you, for not saying everything out loud. I'm sorry that you're not with your daughter right now, and I speak for everyone when I say I'm sorry that you have been hurt. But it was the only way."

The static was replaced by an image of Claire holding a large, card in her hands. Allen looked up at the real Claire, who tilted her head to the side, an answer.

He looked back at the card.

_Ignore everything I'm saying_

The TV was turned away from the surveillance camera, and he understood.

"The Others, they aren't 'others'," Claire said, "they are good people. They just want to help."

Claire in the TV changed the card.

_They are liars_

"I know it's hard for you to believe, it was hard for me too. I tried to escape, tried to fight them. But now I know."

_They will kill us if we try_

"I know it must feel like you don't have a choice."

_We don't_

"But we do. We can choose to bring our kids here, give them a good life."

_Don't bring Ellie here_

"Or we can choose to leave them be. We can choose to go back."

_Don't let these people take Ellie, _Claire switched the card, _You have to get her as far away from them as possible_

"We still have free will."

_Juliet is on our side_

"And I know… it is hard to trust…"

_She'll help us_

"But at least you can trust me. And trust me when I say that bringing Ellie here is the best for everyone."

_But you have to play along_

"They are good people. They won't hurt her."

_DON'T BRING ELLIE HERE!_

Claire on the screen nodded, and switched the card.

_Tell me to turn the movie off_

Allen was silent for a moment, staring at the static on the screen.

"Turn the movie off."

Claire sighed. "Allen –"

"Turn it off!"

Claire took out the tape, flicking off the screen. "Just… think of what I said, okay? Please."

Allen nodded and Claire closed the door behind her.

----

Allen turned the page of the book and didn't even look up when a very pretty, blonde curly-haired woman sat down next to him on the park bench.

"You should stay away from me," Allen said, his voice completely serious as he turned another page, "I'll only break your heart."

"You don't look like that kind of guy that breaks people's hearts," the young woman said cheerfully.

Allen still didn't look up. Behind them in the park, a child's laughter could be heard. "Believe me, I am."

"Oh, yeah? Well then, I got three older brothers with guns and shovels and my dad's a sheriff, just so you know. In case you would break mine." Allen finally looked up. She leaned forward and pressed a kiss against his lips, smiling when she pulled back. "Ready to get some coffee? I think I'm going through withdrawal without it. Lissa was freaking out during class today, the professor was almost ready to call an ambulance, turns out she –"

Allen would many years later, when looking at old picture of his wife think of such moments. His daughter would curl up beside him, tell him about her day and she would just go on and on and on just like Ellie Nolan once had. Until lights flashed and something screeched and the car slammed into theirs and Eloise was gone but little Ellie, his daughter, was alive.

----

"It's me," Claire said as she knocked on the door once, then twice, looking over her shoulder worriedly. She was in the shadows, the lamp outside Juliet's house wasn't lit and there was no one outside as far as she could see.

A smooth, calm voice was heard from the other side of the door, "The door is open, Claire."

Claire blushed slightly, stepping inside Juliet's house.

Juliet said nothing, the ghost of a smile on her lips; she looked so different from that woman with the half-burned cookies, sheepish grins and red striped aprons from before.

"Where's…"

"In the kitchen," replied Juliet quickly, walking before her into the room.

A girl was sitting on one of the chairs; her sad, bright blue eyes looked up at Claire and she grimaced. "Juliet said I was behaving _melodramatic._"

Claire smiled at her choice of words, sitting down next to Maddy. Juliet was still standing up, looking down at the two younger women.

"How did you get out?" Claire asked Maddy after a moment of silence.

"I climbed out the window; I found it to be very efficient when living with Garrett and Liz and outside Karl's window there isn't any camera." She frowned. "Which is strange, you would think Ben had installed once when Karl began meeting Alex."

"Are you sure… this… your house isn't being watched?" Claire asked, turning to Juliet.

"Yes, I'm sure," she replied calmly. "How did it go with Allen?"

"I think – I think he got the message."

"Good, because if we're going to make it," Juliet looked out the window, turning somber, "we're all gonna have to play along."

--

**Author's Notes:** Mostly a set-up for what's to come, so, what do you think?

Thank you for your reviews! Thanks so much! Gosh, you're all so amazing, awesome. Here's a question for you guys, who're your favorite character/characters in LOST? And here in DYBID?

Namaste.


	41. Thinking Me Dead

_And I lie so composedly,  
Now, in my bed,  
(Knowing her love)  
That you fancy me dead-  
And I rest so contentedly,  
Now, in my bed,_

_(With her love at my breast)  
That you fancy me dead-  
That you shudder to look at me, _  
Thinking me dead.

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 34, Thinking Me Dead**

--

"You killed him…" Flor whispered, trembling as she stood up and looked around. Ivan was lying at the entrance of the gray, small room, blood pouring from two bullet wounds in his chest. And the smell – it sickened her down to her very core. "He's dead."

Janna pulled out a band of the black woman's – Lalah's – braids and pulled her hair up in a ponytail. Flor could see that the woman was breathing. Why Janna hadn't killed her just like that blonde woman and Ivan she had no idea.

Janna looked out the door worriedly. "Yes, that's usually what happens after one's been killed," she replied, bending down to drag Ivan's body completely into the room.

Flor stared as Janna with one, slender finger smeared his blood out on the floor. Sloppy, she painted a red flower on the slippery floor.

"You…" Flor couldn't say any more words; the whole world was swimming in front of her eyes and suddenly there was nothing holding her up and she just fell and fell and fell…

Flor woke up to a loud bang, drops of water falling on her face and the thundering sky that could be seen through the canopy of leaves. She just lay there, too scared to sit up and look around, when someone grabbed her shoulder hard, forcing her to sit up.

She whined and stared into the cold, dead eyes of Jóhanna Stefándóttir.

"Get up!" She tucked one of the guns into her holster, the taser into her pants and the second gun she held in her hand.

Flor did as she said, everything feeling a little too surreal and at the same time too much like reality.

"Why…?" Flor croaked, pulling her wet hair out of her face. She looked around, they were in the jungle, but she could see the traces of buildings between the trees.

"Why what?"

"You… killed them… for me…"

"I didn't." She didn't even think about it. "And get moving or I'll shoot you."

Flor walked after her, and to her surprise they were going towards the buildings in sight. "Who are you?"

"I came here on a freighter to save your people's lives. I was here to recon when these people captured me. So, I'm not in good terms with them either, like you Florence Bluth."

"Why did you save me?"

Flor didn't know much about the freighter people – but she knew for sure they weren't on the island to save anyone. Remembering Naomi, she swallowed.

"How do you know my name?"

She was silent for a long moment and Flor, warily of her, slowed her pace slightly. Above them the sky continued to crackle and it suddenly lightened up.

Janna suddenly whirled around, slamming and pinning Flor against a tree. Flor cried out and Janna dug her nails tighter into Flor's skin.

"Listen to me, Bluth. I just risked my neck to save your damn life and now every one of _them _knows we've escaped since I had to sit around and wait for you to wake up! And you asking irrelevant questions is definitely not what we need and unless you want me to finish what_ they_ started I suggest you keep your mouth shut and just follow my lead, okay?"

Flor nodded shakily, her tears mixing with the flood of rain. Janna let go of her and even though Flor most of all wanted to just collapse on the ground she walked fast after the woman.

----

"Jóhanna Stefándóttir," the man said out loud as she seated herself on the chair. He put down the file on the table. "Not even eighteen and already in prison."

The young girl's pale skin looked sick against the orange prison clothes she was wearing. She wasn't looking at the white-haired man at the other side of the table, but on something slightly beside him, her expression emotionless.

"Killed a man, slit his throat. Expecting a life in prison."

He sat down on the chair opposite of hers, put his hands together and smiled. "I'm impressed."

She looked up at that, her icy gaze met his.

"You seem like a very talented young woman." The smile was still on his face.

She uttered the first words since she'd stepped into the cold, claustrophobic room, "And your point being…?"

He chuckled warmly. "Let's get right to the point, shall we? My name is Charles Widmore. I need someone like you. Someone cold, harsh, someone who won't hesitate to follow orders, no matter what they are. I want you to work for me, Jóhanna."

It was either that or prison. She thought of her inmates, smiling in her head at the thought of getting out while they stayed in.

"It's Janna." _Call me something else and I'll slit your throat too._ "What orders are you speaking of?"

----

Lalah groaned, blinking. A second later she came to her senses – realized where she was and what'd happened and she was immediately up on her feet, despite having been stunned six ways from sun –

_Ivan. _

Eyes half-closed, blood gushing from his wounds, spilling out on the floor and smeared out a red lotus was painted.

_Diane._

In the corner, looking like she'd struggled, a shot to her shoulder, her dead eyes, unseeing open as her neck was snapped.

Lalah let herself panic in her mind for two seconds.

Then she stumbled over Ivan's body and out of the room.

This time Janna wasn't getting away.

--

"That is Building 16." Janna nodded at the seeming less abandoned building. Flor couldn't even see a door leading into the place. "I got a package inside of there that I can't leave this island without. With it, I can contact my people at the freighter. Get us all rescued. There won't be many guards inside, the ones there easy to take out, but there will be many security cameras. And anyone watching those – will have my face imprinted in their minds. Everything about me – what I'm wearing, how tall I am, my weight, every little detail about my shoulders just in case I escape."

Flor was still silent, in shock over how close she'd been to death the same day. Sometimes it felt like she faded away completely from everything around her and she would suddenly be face to face with Janna. Expressionless Janna who still seemed to know exactly what Flor was going through – and didn't pity her, feel for her or anything like that. Just knew.

That morning she'd been taken away to be executed, and someone had held her, tried to keep her but she'd been taken by the Others either way.

"My friend," Flor dared to say, "Sean he's…"

Janna snapped her head around, and her burning gaze was enough to shut Flor up again.

"We have to take out the cameras," Janna concluded.

Flor got the courage to speak up again. "My friend… he's good with technical stuff. He's…" Janna hadn't threatened her yet so she continued, "He was taken too. He's locked in a cage outside… one of these building and if we could get him out then…"

"And…?"

Flor licked her lips. "He could help –"

"You're lying. And there is no time. There's only one way in and that's through that door."

Flor couldn't see a door, what she could see was a gigantic tree growing outside, hiding most of the walls from view.

"Unless," there was a spark in Janna's eyes, "we climb."

"We?"

----

Through the open windows the curtains found no rest. The small fake bouquet's leaves continued rustling and the wind was loud, but the room still had an eerie stillness that couldn't be explained from anyone but those who'd been near death.

Over the low coffee table, just beside those fake red and orange flowers a body was spread out. Blood slowly dripped down on the expensive rug underneath, making the brown dark as black.

Janna placed a red lotus flower beside the man, if you didn't know the purpose – if you didn't know what you were looking for you would take that flower as on from the vase.

But it was so much more than that.

Janna turned around, climbing out through the open windows. The same was as she'd come in.

This assassination wasn't like the other ones. It hadn't been an order from Widmore. It had been all her.

This was the man that with cold, almost pitying eyes had told her that she was sick. That she had a disorder, something making her not quite right in the brain. He had told her that she should get help.

She didn't need help from anyone.

The rain started to fall when she was out on the street, many took cover under the roofs but she continued to walk forward.

Suddenly someone tapped her on the shoulder.

She turned around, ready to draw her gun if necessary.

It was an old man, gray hair and wrinkles around his eyes from laughter. He had a black umbrella in his hand.

"A young girl like you shouldn't walk alone through such rain as this. You must be freezing, here, take this." he held his umbrella out.

Janna shook her head.

"No, I insist. You need it more than I do."

Janna took it from him and the drops stopped falling on her. He smiled brightly, walking away and from a nearby stander she heard: "Good to know there's still kindness in this world."

After the man had gone, she dumped the umbrella in a nearby container.

----

Janna hit the floor with almost no sound, but Flor fell in a tangle of limbs, wincing as her bruises ached painfully at the hit.

Janna hissed something between her teeth, a warning for her to be silent. They were in a long dusty corridor, a camera was set up by the wall, pointing in another direction and the whole place was crowded with boxes.

Flor bit her lip from asking any more questions. She wanted to know if it was a storage room, what they kept in there, how the hell Janna was supposed to find whatever she was looking for in the mess.

_This important thing_, she asked in her mind, _are you sure it's down here? If they know it will be the first thing you'll go after, then won't they guard it or move it? Why did you save me?_

Janna suddenly took out her gun. Flor looked around, but she couldn't see anyone else.

Janna whirled around in front of Flor so quickly that she took a step back. She grabbed her arm.

"Stay here. Don't go after me. Don't go anywhere else or I'll shoot you, right?"

Flor nodded. Janna let go of her and ran through the corridor to the door, closing it behind her after she'd gone.

Flor stood there for a moment, freaking out in her mind. Outside through the open window they'd crawled through the rain was pouring. She put her arms around herself. She could climb back down the tree, down to the ground and find Sean, get him out of there and they could escape…

But she was really too old to believe in fairytales.

She crossed the corridor, not to the door Janna had gone through, but to one of the others. She pressed her ear against it; there was no sound coming from inside.

She took a deep breath and turned the handle.

The door opened.

_Curiosity killed the cat._

In difference from the place she'd left behind, the small room inside was organized. There were shelves full with files, papers notes and a dark lined up at the back of the room.

She was just about to close the door when one file caught her eye.

It was labeled_ Austen. Katherine_

She took another step inside the room, her eyes turned to the next one.

_Austen. Dominic_

She looked at the others shelves.

_Reyes. Hugo_

_Reyes. Wendy_

She ran across the room, seeing other's names. Some unknown to her, some people she'd survived with. Known. Betrayed.

Then she saw her own name.

_Bluth. Florence_

She looked over her shoulder. But she didn't see or hear Janna through the open door.

With a trembling hand, she took out the file.

She opened it.

It was empty.

She swallowed. And then she heard someone walking down the corridor, quickly she put the file back.

Then something on the desk caught her eye.

As soon as she left the room Janna pressed the gun into her head. "What did I tell you?"

"S-Sorry." Flor closed her eyes, swallowing hard in fear.

"If – you're lucky I haven't killed you." Janna let her hand with the gun fall to her side, letting Flor go.

Flor exhaled deeply. Janna began to walk down the opposite end of the corridor.

"Why haven't you?" Flor shouted, probably teasing fate and death with those words.

"Because a promise is a promise," Janna muttered.

Flor looked up at the surveillance camera, but Janna didn't seem the least worried about it.

_What made you this way?_

----

Janna approached the woman sitting on the park bench with long, confident steps. In the distance, she saw a man walk away, rounding a corner and disappearing.

The woman on the bench looked up, dropping a photograph on the ground. Janna caught it quickly before the wind could take it away.

The man on the picture wasn't looking at the camera, his brown eyes were turned to something out of the shot, he was smiling – maybe smirking, the shot wasn't the best in quality and his hair was light brown, too light.

"That's one of his many disguises," Naomi told her. Janna sat down beside her, still fixated on the photograph. "This is how he really looks."

It was a mug shot. The man wasn't smiling in this one, and his eyes weren't brown but green. The quality was much better and Janna could see the freckles on his face, his darker, longer brown hair. There was something cruel in the way he was looking, something that immediately made Janna interested in him. This was not going to be like her usual work.

"And those two women?" Janna nodded at the other photographs in Naomi's lap.

"Kaylee Ann Evans and Katherine Austen."

"It's not strange at all." Janna put the photographs in her bag.

When she looked up again, Naomi was holding a cell phone in front of her face.

"Widmore wants to talk to you."

----

_Who promised you?_ Flor asked, but there was no answer, because Janna was many things but she was no mind reader.

Janna though, seemed to understand that Flor needed some answers, anything at all, even though the answers weren't much answers.

"It's in the west side of the building."

"If you told me what we're looking for –"

Janna opened the door, and immediately a shot was fired their way. Flor screamed, flatting herself against the floor. Janna fired two shots and it went silent.

It was the first guards they'd encountered. Why weren't there more? What if there were more? Would they come now?

Janna took a hard grip around her arm and pulled her up on her feet. "I shoot quickly," she said. "Okay?"

_So don't bother trying to hide._

Flor closed her eyes, and Janna let her do that. She just couldn't see them… knowing that she had been so close to come out the same way.

She almost tripped, and her eyes flew open.

It wasn't as horrible as she thought it would be. Not like after she'd almost been killed. They were just… faces, one in a thousand, she suddenly felt eerily calm, calmer than she'd ever been since she first was kidnapped.

Janna looked at her, but it was impossible to know what she was thinking. Flor liked to think that Janna was realizing that yes; the frightened near-death girl was growing a spine.

Or maybe becoming a psychopath, because she couldn't feel the warmth, cold anymore and everything she heard was like she was listening to it underwater.

Janna stopped in her tracks. "This is the right corridor. Start opening the doors."

"What if there are more guards?"

"They've already been taken care of. Those two were the last. But that doesn't mean there aren't more coming."

Flor nodded, and wondered who had taken care of them. Did Janna have someone on the inside? Or was she simply lying?

Janna opened the first door, pointing the gun ahead of her just in case. Flor wished she has something to protect herself with.

She opened a door at random; all it led to was an empty room. She sighed.

The next one was locked. "Janna!" she shouted.

Janna swung around with the gun still in her hands. For a moment Flor was afraid she was going to shoot _her._

"This door is locked. Could it be it?"

Janna hurried over to her. She inspected the door for a few seconds, tilting her head to the side.

Then she, with one well-aimed kick slammed the door open.

The person sitting in the chair rose immediately, turning around. His expression turned from surprise to hate in a second, his arms were red and bruised just like Flor's.

"_You_," Sawyer snarled, just before he leaped forward and threw the punch.

----

Years later, Janna's dark hair was longer, and on her right hand there were burn marks and faded scars. Not even she came out from a fight without a reminder.

"I need someone like you," Widmore had said; just like he'd said the first time they met. But this time it was for something much different.

She was early, and there was no one to check her in. Not that she needed that. The market place surrounding her was quiet this early in the morning, but the air was still warm and she could see out of the corner of her eye people walking towards the place.

The Kahana looked dirty, not exceptionally comfortable but far more practical. Janna came onboard the ship – the ship that would take her to the island.

Naomi was on the deck, the only one up there for the moment, and she turned around, smiling broadly when she saw Janna.

"There you are."

"Obviously," Janna replied.

"I'll show you to your berth." Naomi led Janna down through the corridors of the _Kahana._

Janna frowned and looked up when water dripped down on her from the pipes, Naomi looked sheepishly at her.

"Might not be a five star cruise, but it's good enough."

She opened a door and Janna was faced by a gray, almost empty room but the bed with and the small window in the wall, showing the wharf outside.

"The captain wants to see you as soon as possible. So just leave your bags here and come with me."

Janna was just silent.

The Captain was slouched in his chair, feet up on the desk and he didn't even look up as they entered, apparently engrossed in the maps in his hand.

"Naomi has filled you in on your… special mission, I assume." He put down the maps on his desk and met her gaze. "Isn't that right, Janna?"

Naomi must have filled him in on how much she hated to be called anything else too.

"Yes." Her lips twitched, like she wanted to smile. Captain Gault must have seen it, because he smiled.

"Good. I have absolute trust that you will be able to follow it to the end. Now, this won't be like your other jobs. If you would like to take a seat…" He turned his eyes to Naomi, who rolled hers.

"I can take a hint." She spun on her heel and left.

Gault turned back to Janna who sat down on the chair on the opposite side of him at the desk.

"Now, we have much to discuss."

----

Janna grabbed his arm, pulled it behind his back and slammed him up against the wall.

Flor stood there, completely in shock, barely hearing what Janna was snarling out at Sawyer.

"Don't!" she screamed when Janna pressed the gun into the back of Sawyer's head. "He's a prisoner – like me – don't kill him! He can help you – if he's been inside this building maybe he knows how to find whatever you're looking for!"

Sawyer laughed, but it got stifled because of the wall. Whatever he was saying got lost as Janna spoke much louder, much angrier, "If he's a prisoner then why did he try to kill you?"

"Because – I…" Flor looked down. "Because he thinks… Because I killed – I killed the person he cares most about."

"Then I should kill him."

"No! Why?"

"Because otherwise he will kill you."

"If you kill him then I won't tell you where it is!"

Both Janna and Sawyer got silent. Janna let go of Sawyer and he stumbled away from the wall, but she still pointed the gun at him. Sawyer just looked from her to Flor, his eyes dark.

"I won't give you the satellite phone."

Janna still held the gun high in the air. Flor couldn't tell if she was surprised, mad, angry – she was unreadable. While Sawyer, was slightly smirking.

"Well, well, well," he said, raising his eyebrows, "looks like I got caught in the middle of an escape drama. Please tell me that you killed that Bug-Eyed Bastard, Sunshine."

"Shut up or I'll shoot you," Janna said calmly. "Fine. But if he tries to kill you again…"

"What, you gonna shoot me? Gonna shoot me 'cause I spoke? Empty threats is just the beginning of you, isn't it? And who said I wanted to live anyway?"

Janna released the safety.

Sawyer got silent.

Flor smiled, while on the inside it felt like she was going to break down at any second.

As they all came out in the corridor again, Sawyer looked around, obviously confused.

"Where are all the guards…?" His voice trailed off when he saw the two bodies by the doors. He immediately looked up at the security camera. "Why ain't this place stormed yet?"

Flor wanted to know the answer to the same question, but Janna didn't answer it.

Flor led them back to the same corridor she and Janna had entered from. She almost tripped over a box on the way to the door.

"It's in here."

Janna, still aiming the gun at Sawyer, scanned the room with her eyes, going over all the cabinets housing all the different files, to the desk.

That was when Flor noticed the absence of the cracking thunder, of the pondering rain. She whirled around, and saw that the window was closed.

Sawyer and Janna were still inside the room with the files. She looked around the corridor. Saw that one of the doors – was open just a little.

She made a run for it.

When she climbed down the tree, the rain pounding hard down on her through the branches, she caught a glimpse of someone running through the corridor.

She couldn't hear much over the thunder. She landed on the grass, biting her lip. She heard a gunshot and flinched.

There was no one around.

Not thinking back, she ran for the jungle.

--

Lalah was running down the corridors of Building 16 when she heard screams from above. She ran up the stairs quickly but silently.

She heard someone's voice and held the rifle higher. Slowly and silently she closed in on them.

For one moment, there, so close to Janna – she considered to actually kill her. To put an end to it all – to them. To the cat and mouse game they'd had going on since Janna first came to the island.

Safety released. Trigger pulled. Bullet straight to the head. Or heart. Lalah wasn't picky – whatever got the job done.

She came up on the right corridor.

A shot sounded. A scream was heard.

Silence.

Lalah flattened herself against the wall, ready with the rifle in her grip. She held her breath until the noises from the fight stopped. But it was hard – she was still hurt from the taser – her body aching and her head swimming but _this was work._ Concentration the most important factor, concentrate at the task at hand.

As soon as she saw the shadow of someone closing in on the door she swung the rifle.

The prisoner – a face she hadn't seen much of ducked but was hit on the side of his head, a trail of blood running down his face. (James Ford: Preferred Sawyer because of his revenge driven search after the guy who killed his parents.)

Diane was lying passed out on the floor just by their side.

He lashed out and Lalah easily avoided his blow. She couldn't see Janna anywhere. But she knew she was hiding somewhere in the rows and rows of files.

Sawyer picked up a gun – Diane's but Lalah knocked it out of his hands with a kick. Her fist connected with his jaw and his head flew back and hit the wall. Still, he was standing.

"A feisty one," he chuckled through the blood on his lips and from his nose. He swung out with a punch again and Lalah avoided it just as easily. _The desk – the satellite phone's gone. _

To be able to concentrate better – Lalah finally knocked him out over the head with the rifle. Sawyer collapsed on the floor. She whirled around, studying the room with her eyes.

"I know you are here," Lalah whispered. "You're good – but no one's better than me. You know that. Don't you _Red Lotus?_"

Lalah gasped in surprise and collapsed in spasms on the floor, passing out. Behind her stood Sawyer with a taser in his hand.

"Have no idea who Red Flower Girl is, but at least she hasn't tied me up yet." He looked up and said in a sing-song voice, "You can come out now."

Janna showed up from the shadows like she'd just appeared.

"As they say: There's no place like home. If you'll keep your promise."

"I'll keep it."

----

"I heard you were assigned to protect us."

The slender blonde woman glanced at the red-head who sat down beside her.

"You heard right." She took up the fork, looking down at the mysterious food the chef has served for the day.

Janna was sitting in the corner, alone. She was eating the food slowly, a wise act, those who ate the food quickly always seemed to have to stay in their quarters because of a small 'flu', more like food poisoning.

The red-haired woman, with the very pale eyes, was Charlotte Staples Lewis. She was a cultural anthropologist. A part of the science team.

The other woman was a mercenary. Keamy had very little respect for her it seemed, but Janna had seen her with a gun. She was a good shooter, Milou Van Dyck. And she had hit the chef according to the rumors.

Charlotte and Milou continued to speak in low voices, and Janna turned her attention to the man approaching them.

When he sat down beside Charlotte, Milou immediately stood up.

"What was that all about?" Charlotte asked Miles, looking after Milou.

"Ah, she's just not used to hang around guys who talk to dead people. And what the hell is this crap?" He was looking down at his food.

Miles Straume. Now, he was interesting. Apparently he could speak to dead people.

Janna snapped her head round when another red-head sat down opposite of her. Nonchalantly she started to eat the food, a book beside the plate that she was reading.

Janna stared at her for a long time until she finally looked up.

"I'm not gonna ask if the seat's taken." When she looked up, Janna saw that she had violet eyes. "Okay?"

"Why do you have violet eyes?"

"What?"

"It's called conversation. If you want to avoid that I suggest you leave the seat."

The woman rolled her eyes but stayed. "Why are you here?"

"Why are you?" Janna noticed that the book she was reading was in Italian.

"Know what? You can sit on your own." The woman threw her hair back and ran off.

She'd forgotten her book.

Janna found her later on the night up on the deck. She was looking out at the ocean.

Janna knew her name now. It was Christiana Wood, but just like Janna she preferred to be called something else.

She turned around when Janna walked up to her by the railing.

Janna handed the book to her and she took it and she gazed up at the dark night sky.

"Why do you hide the knives in your shoes?" she asked in an airy, distant voice. And Janna understood why everyone thought she was so weird.

"Why do you have violet eyes?"

Christiana smirked, almost laughing. "Why are you here?"

"Why are you here?"

She finally laughed. "I'm here to show that I can take care of myself."

She snorted. Of course, the only interesting person on the ship was not interesting at all. Below the face of a woman there was a little childish girl. "I am here to kill someone."

"Oh." Instead of looking scared, Christiana only looked more intrigued.

"Yes."

"Who are you here to kill?"

"I'm here to kill Fox Edwards," Janna whispered.

The woman giggled, seeing through the lie. "What a coincidence," she said, "that you are here to kill him."

"Tell me," the woman said and leaned in closer. "Do you believe it was destiny that brought us here?"

Janna looked up at the stars.

"No."

----

Everyone was looking after them now.

Flor hid behind the bushes, resting her back on a rock. It felt like she was about to drown on the rain. Her heart pounded in her ears and she should be running – fleeing but she was too tired to do so.

She cupped her hands, caught the drops in her open palms and drank. Thinking of what she should do.

She'd left Sawyer and Janna to their fates, but Sawyer would survive. He always did. And when he knew why she'd run… he wouldn't stop hating her, but he would understand.

She got up on her feet again. Still feeling so tired, but with a goal in mind she set off through the jungle again. She wasn't quick, she wasn't graceful and she tripped over the stones, fell down the small slopes. Hands dug into the mud, and she was breathing hard when she stood up again.

That was when she noticed the security camera hidden in the tree. It was turned towards her and her heart froze in sight of it – and then she thought that maybe it wasn't working. Technology plus water equaled many unfortunate accidents, right?

If she was going to help Sean to escape she had to do it quickly. Time was running out. And if she got caught now – there wouldn't be a month. There wouldn't be a goodbye. It would be a bullet to the head and then nothing.

She ran past the security camera up in the tree. The sky lit up by a bolt. Instincts told her to get the hell out of there – lightning bolts always struck the trees, didn't they?

She ran until she saw glints of dark, dark waves through the trees and then there was sand under her feet.

She looked around, but there was only the beach. Empty of people. Full with things that had gone in with the crashing waves, seashells, green, white, brown sea grass and in came more with the black water.

She was on the wrong side of the island.

She had no idea where she was.

She cried out in despair, anger, frustration and collapsed. Just about to cry – again – always the tears – when she looked out over the sea and saw the dark – the shadow – the silhouette of the other island.

Home.

Rescuing Sean was one thing.

Getting back was another.

The Others didn't have wings on their backs, so there had to be boats around somewhere.

--

Claret rushed out of the door. The rain hit her hard and she was soaked in the matter of seconds. The wind was blowing hard, trying to take her away with it. She saw Sean, sitting in the corner of Flor's cage with his knees drawn up to his chest, looking like he was drowning.

The keys kept slipping out of her fingers but she finally managed to get the lock up. Sean was just sitting there, maybe he hadn't heard her. The storm was loud, and if anything Ben had told her it would only get worse. But it was hard to tell with the island, but one thing was for sure, it was suicide to get out there on the water now.

"Get up!" she yelled. Hurrying over to Sean sides, she put a small hand on his arm. "Come on!"

Sean made no move, didn't acknowledge her.

She tried to make him look at her, but he refused to, like a little child.

"She isn't dead!"

He finally looked up. Claret was scared for one moment that he would try to hit her – escape but he did nothing of that.

"She escaped. Everyone is looking after her. But she escaped."

There was no reason for him to believe her, even though she was speaking the truth.

Either way, he still got up on his feet, and followed her inside the building.

--

"That phone really that important to you? I know there ain't any local shops nearby but there gotta be more on the boat thing you came in on."

The blood washed off Sawyer's hands like all the songs were sins did the same thing – metaphorically of course – and when getting over the small enlightenment that the young girl – Janna was a freakin' murder machine, he could concentrate on how the hell they were getting off the island.

"It's very important." Janna looked down at the satellite phone, hitting it angrily with her hand. Whatever was the problem with it didn't seem to get fixed if the angry growl was anything to go by. "Hurry up!"

"I don't know what you think you're following – but this friggin' monsoon is washing away everything!"

"Not everything."

Sawyer shook his head. But he was still going after her; Xena was his ticket off the island because of Bluth's guilty heart that made her want to save him.

Didn't matter if she was feeling guilty or not. It didn't change the fact that Rosalie was six feet under because of her.

"What's so damn important about her anyway?"

"Who?"

Sawyer rolled his eyes. "Who do ya think? Florence – the Bluth chick. Traitor. Murderer, you take your pick. It's her you're chasing right?"

"I made a promise that I would protect her."

"Why?"

"Because a promise is a promise."

Well that wasn't vague at all. "That's not why I asked."

"And your point being…?"

Sawyer decided to change the subject. The thunder got louder and he had to shout, "What's up with that thing anyway?"

"We're outside the radius."

"Radius of – hold on!" He grabbed her arm and before she could karate him or whatever he pointed at the tree, at the security camera.

"Don't worry it's not working." She shrugged him off. "Touch me again and I'll shoot you."

Sawyer wasn't exactly taking her threats seriously. "And how the hell do you know that?"

"Keep walking."

----

"Recon. We go in. We go out."

Janna nodded.

"You know what happens if anything goes wrong?" Naomi asked.

Janna raised an eyebrow.

"I know you don't like me bossing you around, Janna. But it's important."

Janna nodded and turned around to leave the room.

"And…"

She stopped.

"This is not a personal mission. Whatever promises you've made, they don't have to be kept, all right?"

Janna didn't answer. She opened the door and with a sigh Naomi followed her up on the deck.

"You girls ready for the ride?" Lapidus asked, grinning.

None of them answered him.

"Okay, this will be fun," he said sarcastically. He waved a hand at the chopper. "Take your seat. We won't stop for breaks and it's gonna be a bumpy ride."

----

They found her desperately running around on the beach. She looked crazy – her dark, dark hair clinging to her body, a test hanging over her face, her eyes big, round, freaky when she looked at them. She was clawing at the sand like it was keeping all the treasures in the world, but then like it was her worst enemy. With the rain falling, the sky cracking it was like a very bad horror movie.

"There's no way off!" she screamed when she saw them come out of the jungle, Sawyer staring at her, Janna all expressionless – so cold.

"Okay! There's no damn way off!"

"It's shock," Janna mumbled to Sawyer who stared at Flor like she'd lost her mind, which she had.

Then Flor got up, started to march off toward the forest but Janna stopped her. Not with the gun or with the taser but with a surprisingly gentle hand.

"He's not there."

"What?" Flor stopped, looking at her, her eyes now slightly less crazy but instead sadder.

"That man, you wanted to go rescue – Sean. He's not back at the cages where they kept you. We went by it and there was no one there."

"You're –"

"No. I'm not."

Flor looked down, knowing that she wasn't lying.

"When I said let's get the hell out of this place – I wasn't lying either." She looked at Sawyer. "Come on."

She walked before the both of them. And Sawyer looked at her – not with that 'she's frigging insane' look but with his brows furrowed and with his eyes dark and Flor _knew_ what he meant by that look.

But instead of lashing out he just shrugged and went after Janna up the beach.

"I've escaped… and gotten caught. And escaped again." Janna led them back into the jungle again. "I've tried to escape so many times. I know how they work. I know how they think. I know that this time…" She pushed some branches aside and walked up beside a big bed of leaves and branches on the ground. "I won't get caught."

There was a canoe hidden underneath.

"Well," Sawyer chuckled, but it was barely heard over the rain, "you got a very well thought plan here, Sunshine. In case you've forgotten – we're in the middle of a FRIGGING HURRICANE!"

Janna stared at him for a long time without blinking. Flor started to twist her hands. The rain continued to fall.

"Then stay."

----

Janna's eyes flew open.

Something was sticking into her back. She was lying on bushes. Her body was tangled into the parachute and her head was pounding. Small drops of rain fell down on her.

She hissed through her teeth as she took the parachute off her back, rolling to the side and on the grass.

Memories of what'd happened flashed through her mind. The chopper had malfunctioned – she and Naomi had jumped out – something…

Janna stood up, everything going black before her eyes for a few seconds before she could see again. There was a jungle behind her. But in front of her over the green, green grass…

Pylons.

A shot was fired.

It whizzed by her by several feet. She whirled around, grabbing her backpack and dragging it with her through the jungle. Another bullet was fired her way. She didn't look over her shoulder. She just ran over the stones and the small clearing. Through the endless trees, everywhere they were around her.

She ducked behind a big black rock. She opened her backpack, finding the satellite phone she grabbed it and left the baggage there. Janna darted faster now without the weight on her shoulders.

She leaped over a branch on the ground. Furiously she tried to start the phone in her hand. She had to find out where Naomi was. From her holster she took out a gun.

Now she turned around.

She fired two bullets toward her follower. Still with one hand she was trying to start the phone.

"Come on," she begged. No more shots were fired her way and she ran down a slope, stones falling down under her steps. "Come _on_."

A dot appeared on the screen.

"Stop or I'll shoot."

A gun pressed into her back. But it was quickly removed before Janna could whirl around and change the tables. She looked over her shoulder at the beautiful black woman standing behind her, pointing a gun directly at her.

"Drop your gun," she said calmly.

"You should drop yours."

The woman smirked. "I don't think so."

"You really should."

And then Janna threw the knife at her.

----

Flor spit water out of her mouth. She was paddling as fast as she could – but it made no difference. The waves were rocking them around. She coughed, choking on the water again. The sky lit up by another bolt and Sawyer was yelling behind her to the heavens in anger.

Flor screamed and almost dropped the paddle when another wave washed over them.

"WE'RE SOON THERE!" Janna screamed, her voice breaking at the end when the canoe began to tip to the side.

"LEAN TO THE OTHER!" Sawyer screamed. And Flor did so, stopping to paddle, holding her breath.

A wave came in from the other side. And she wondered if they would begin to sink.

She couldn't sink – she – they would lose everything.

"PADDLE!" she screamed. She could see the silhouette of the island getting closer. But everything was so dark – dark and blue. The sky became the ocean, and the ocean melted into the sky and they were drowning above the surface.

But she wouldn't give up.

She cried with relief when they hit the shore. The canoe in one piece and soaked to their bones.

Janna didn't take one moment to breathe. She got them up on their feet, dragged them into the jungle.

She turned around to look at the both of them. "Which way is your ca –"

"WATCH OUT!"

Janna swung around but it was too late. The branch fell down on her and in one split second it hit her over the head and she fell down to the ground. Blood ran down her face as she blinked it away, wincing when she removed the branch from her body.

Flor took up a rock from the ground and slammed it over Janna's head.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING?" Sawyer screamed.

"Poor little crazy Flor, screaming and crying when she can't find her way home," Flor said in a sing-song voice when she bent down, taking Janna's taser.

Sawyer leaped forward, knocked her out of the way and took Janna's gun. He swung around and pointed it at her.

"DON'T!" Flor screamed, up on her feet and with her hands in front of her, like that would save her from the bullets. "You don't understand –"

Sawyer cocked the gun.

Flor screamed desperately, "I HAVE TO SAVE HER!"

Sawyer furrowed his brow. "What?"

"PLEASE – just let me – you can shoot me if you want to but just let me talk first, okay?"

Sawyer was still holding the gun in the air but he didn't do anything.

Flor took out some documents, wrapped in plastic from her bra.

Sawyer raised an eyebrow.

"I don't exactly have pockets!" she shouted in defense. "Look!"

Sawyer looked, but he couldn't see much over the rain.

"This – these are maps! Maps and documents of their real home! There is this… fence around everything but they live in houses! These barracks with electricity – I think. And – and that's not all." She took a deep breath. "It says where Eva is."

"That's where they were taking Sean," Sawyer said to himself.

"What?"

He nodded at Janna. "She and I overheard them when we were chasing after ya. They were gonna bring O'Donnell – Mister Military Guy to the Barracks. Their home. I guess that's it."

"Yes…" Flor seemed to actually want to smile. So Sawyer growled and she looked scared again.

"Give me those documents!"

"No – Sawyer – come with me."

"What?"

"Janna… she's… she's from that freighter. And she's a killer. She's _insane._ She's not here to rescue us, Sawyer. We need to get as far away from her as possible. And… and we can save Eva. We can go now and we, the both of us can save her. These documents… there are other ways in. Everywhere."

"I don't need you to save her –"

"Yes, yes, Sawyer you do. You can't save her on your own."

Sawyer sighed. "If what you're saying is true – then I gotta get back to the beach and warn everybody. You're right about one thing – she got more than one screw lose in her head."

He lowered his gun.

"Okay," Flor nodded, "here's the plan."

"But," Sawyer stopped her, "it doesn't mean I won't kill you when it's over."

--

Sean and Jack looked quite happy to see each other, Claret thought when she walked down the corridor. She could faintly hear the storm raging outside. She hadn't been able to control the weather.

"Claret, wait."

She turned around and saw Ben stand in a doorway.

"What?" she said with a kind smile.

"Come in with me please."

Claret nodded and followed him into the monitor room.

"As you see all the cameras are out." Ben waved a hand at the static on the screens. "Have been for many hours. Except for the morning. They were working just fine then but…. the security footage had accidentally been deleted."

"So it's a malfunction then." Claret still had the smile on her face.

"Yes, a great coincidence that the day of the malfunction Janna managed to escape and take Florence Bluth with her, on her execution day. And we who had such great security around her."

"It's a great coincidence, indeed."

Ben looked into Claret's eyes. "But I still can't figure out why she saved James Ford and then how she found the satellite phone."

Claret shrugged. "If I didn't know better, I would say someone had told her."

"Yes." Ben looked down. "But since there's no footage –"

"We'll never know."

"Either way," Ben turned to her again, "searching after them – in this weather – it useless. I guess they finally got away."

Claret nodded again. They were silent for a while, looking at the static on the screens.

"Well, I'm really, really tired." Claret turned around to leave when Ben said:

"Walking back and forth from Building 16 must be exhausting."

She looked down, a hand on the door.

"Thank you, Claret."

"I didn't do it for you." Claret opened the door and left the room.

Flor would probably never find out what she did. But it didn't matter. She was alive.

Now she needed to speak with José Gonzales.

--

**Author's Notes: **And one escape plan worked… sort of.

The response I have gotten from the two last chapters have been amazing. And I want to thank every single one of you for reviewing, you're awesome. I've had a very rough week – and it's only been two days.

Namaste.


	42. A Mystery, Part 1

A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
_Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,  
Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would controul,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
For that bright hope at last  
And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

--

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 35, A Mystery**

--

"Sun! Help me – can you –" Margo growled in frustration as the tarp was snatched right out of Sun's grip by the wind. She chased after it, catching it just right before it landed in the sea.

The waves were high, they'd already washed away Neil's tent and it was rising. With the rain pounding down on them it almost felt like they were all swimming around.

She hurried past all the people trying to salvage the food they could, rescue their belongings. The tarp was in her arms. Strands from her ponytail hung in front of her eyes but she could see Rose stand by the half-built church.

Only half of the roof was done. She handed the tarp to Kate and looked around at the people who'd gathered inside.

"Have you seen Zidler?" she shouted Rose, because that was mostly the only way you could make your voice heard over the rain.

"Last time I saw him he was looking after Wendy. Don't worry, honey." Rose smiled warmly, but there as a hint of worry in her eyes. "Looks like everybody's coming our way."

Wendy turned around. Rose was right; the survivors were hurrying over to the church, carrying anything they could hold.

"Now let's get you inside."

Meanwhile Zidler was rescuing babies and saving babies in danger and whatnot. He took up Aaron from his crib, he was wailing loudly and he was afraid he would drop him. He looked around worriedly.

"Hey Bonnie!" he shouted.

Bonnie snorted at the very pathetic impression Zidler and the baby gave. She took Aaron from his arms and told him to find Charlie before she would drown in tears too.

Bonnie left and Zidler returned to get bloody drowned while on land.

"You seen Charlie?" he asked Kaylee who was dragging her bags after her. Kaylee looked up after a while, and she looked very tired and annoyed. She pointed further up the beach, by the trees, before returning to her task with new determination.

Zidler couldn't hear what Charlie was yelling over the storm, but he could clearly see that he wasn't in his best of moods. He and little Ellie were standing by the trees – and with how much the trees were swaying that couldn't be very safe.

"WHERE is it, Ellie?" he could hear Charlie ask through his teeth in anger when he got closer.

Ellie looked close to tears, but it was hard to tell with all the rain on her face.

"What's going on?" Zidler asked when he came up to them. Ellie immediately clung to him.

"Before the rain became end-of-the-world weather she took my bloody guitar! And she says she _accidentally_ left it in the jungle!" Charlie whined, frustrated he looked around, hoping to see his guitar appear out of nowhere.

Ellie stomped her foot on the ground, her lip trembled when she yelled, "A branch fell down!"

She was definitely sobbing and Zidler put an arm around her. "I was s-scared."

Charlie looked like he was about to yell some more. But Zidler raised his eyebrows warningly and he sighed in irritation instead.

"Fine," he muttered. "Where did you last see it?"

Ellie looked anxiously at Zidler and then she pointed at the jungle.

"Bloody brilliant." Charlie threw a worried look at the jungle. But then he marched off into it anyway.

Ellie looked down and sniffed. Zidler almost didn't hear what she said because her usual chirpy tone was replaced by a low whisper, "Daddy used to sing songs to me. He's gone now. So I thought I could sing to myself."

Zidler didn't really know what to say to that. His dad hadn't really sung anything at all to him, and those times he'd heard him get a little chipper about songs was too traumatic for him to think about. He looked up; someone had to be good at this stuff.

That was when he saw Wendy.

"HEY! Wendy!" But Wendy completely ignored him and everyone else around her as she stomped off toward the trees. Not paying any attention to the howling wind and the rain.

"ANDREA!"

Andrea turned around from the food stand, her bag was open and it was full of papayas and mangos. She rushed over to them when she saw Ellie's sad face.

"Could you take her to the church? I gotta get Wendy."

Andrea nodded and took up Ellie in her arms, despite the bag hanging over her shoulder and the backpack on her back. Ellie immediately wrapped her arms around her. "Is the church good?"

Zidler shrugged, anxiously looking at the jungle where he saw Wendy disappear into. "I guess. I really…" He couldn't see her anymore. "Gotta run." And he ran away.

He ducked under a branch, tripped over a few stones. It was even harder to walk through the jungle now than before. Everything looked eerily green, like all the colors had gotten saturated by the rain.

"Wendy!" he shouted, trying to think of a reason why she went into the jungle in the middle of a freaking storm. Charlie he understood – the man had an unexplainable love to his guitar. "Wendy?"

He suddenly saw her brown hair out of the corner of his eye. She was standing next to a tree, glowering at him. Her hands pulled into fists and she looked quite cute when she was murderous.

That was a weird thought.

"Come on," Zidler said, trying to ignore the furious scowl on her face, "we're all going to the church to take cover. Before this thing turns into a real storm."

He knew this had something to do with Karl, of course. But over the past days she's gotten better, he thought. She'd started talking and smile and she hadn't locked herself out of reality.

Wendy stared. And then she started to run.

"WENDY!"

--

It was when the tent finally buckled under and fell on top of him that he woke. Dom got himself loose from the tangled mess, crawling his way out of the rubble. Rain hit his face, everywhere there were people running. The small downfall had turned into a storm.

He got up to his feet quickly. He was still in a daze from his dreams, despite the rain and by how he'd been woken.

"Hurley, hey! Hey!" Hurley turned around, he was carrying two bags. "What's up, dude?" He looked worriedly at the jungle, where the wind was dragging at the trees, looking like it would take the forest away. "You know, apart from the hurricane – storm – I don't really know."

"You seen Kaylee?"

"Uh…" Hurley looked unsure.

"Have you seen her?" Dom repeated in an angry shout.

Hurley shook his head, surprised at his outburst. And Dom left before he had the chance to say anything more.

"Kay?" he shouted, turning around at the spot, trying to see her through all the endless blue. "KAY?"

"You looking for Ring Girl?"

Dom whirled around, and was face to face with Desmond.

"What?"

"Ring Girl – Kaylee. I saw her up the beach," he looked over his shoulder and pointed, "over there…"

Dom was already running before he'd finished his sentence. He saw her dragging two bags behind her, panting and tucking away strands of hair that kept falling in front of her face. She looked up when she heard him rushing towards her.

"Dom! Hey, could you help me with this I –"

"Where the hell were you?"

The smile disappeared off her face. "What?" she yelled.

"I was looking everywhere for you!"

"What?" she repeated, and he saw how she tensed, turning defensive but really not, trying to read the situation – read him. "Okay, you're acting very weird right now but –"

Dom snatched one of the bags right out of her hands, and slung over his shoulder. "Let's go." The dream he'd had was still ever present, and he wasn't really sure what he was doing. He needed to get Kaylee out of the rain, he knew that. Fast.

"Let's go where? DOM!" she screamed when he started to walk away from her. He halted, slowly becoming more present in the reality. And the reality was that Kaylee wouldn't just get bosses around.

She ran up to him, panting a little. "What's going on?"

Her curious green eyes were narrow in fury, but when she got to take a good look at his face they widened. He knew he looked horrible, flushed spots on his skin like he was sick, dark shadows under his eyes, soaked to the bones from the rain. He didn't need her to look at him like that, with pity. So it was with renewed strength he began to walk away from her again.

"You shouldn't go away alone like that," he muttered.

"Go away?" Her voice was loud, high-pitched. "I was saving our stuff from washing away with the ocean!"

"You could get hurt!" And there was that line he'd delivered so many times. And it was one of those things that drove her mad.

"You – you –" she sputtered, looking so frustrated with him, he knew she would. "I've already been hurt." Like he didn't know that. "And you're – LOOK AT ME!"

And it was then, at the desperate scream that he turned to her, snapped back, crashing onto the real moment.

"I'm not a little porcelain doll that will break!" she shrieked. "Even though you seem to think so! I don't care whatever you saw out there – I've also seen things that aren't supposed to be there. And it ended up with me killing a woman! So get your act together, please! And don't pretend you're this overprotective caring person when you're not!"

She took the bag from him and he noticed that she was crying. Her tears blended with the rain when she walked away. She's said nonsense mixed with the truth. And there was that thing that she knew made him angry – caring.

He grabbed her arm, and she had no choice but to look at him, despite that that was the last thing she wanted.

"I _care._"

----

Dom took one glance at who was at the door and fired his gun.

"Who the hell is this?" he roared.

"You almost shot her!" Kate helped the black-haired chick up on her feet. She scowled at him like he was the one who'd done something wrong. "You okay?"

The woman nodded, throwing Dom a curious glance despite the fact that he'd almost put a bullet though her head. Her eyes were a bright green color; just like Kate she had freckles all over her face. Nice-looking.

Still a stranger.

"You're not answering my question." He still held the gun in the air. But the woman didn't seem any nervous at all at the sight of it. Like she was used to have weapons pointed at her. Just like him and Kate.

"I'm Kaylee Evans," she spoke up, placing her hands on her hips and studied him up and down. "I guess you're Dominic."

"Kate? Care to explain why you bring a total stranger here?"

"She's not a stranger," Kate spoke up, all too cheerful for Dom's liking. Her eyes were shining – Kate's eyes didn't shine. They were more like… always dark in dislike of the humanity or something." I've been with her for weeks now, we meet outside of Iowa."

That meant Kate had returned to see their mother, wonderful.

"No excuse to bring random chicks here."

Kate raised her eyebrows. "If that's not double standard I don't know what is. We can trust her."

Dom lowered the gun and took a step forward. "You just leave. Don't call, don't write and then show up with – _her _and you expect me to –"

"You know what?" Kay said awkwardly, clearing her throat. "I'm gonna go to the bathroom while you're having this discussion. This siblings stuff is bringing back horrid traumatic memories."

When she walked into the room and closed the door behind her, Dom wasn't really sure whether or not she had been serious. But that didn't matter, what mattered was that his little sis dared to have such a smug smirk on her face after this. "Have you gone freaking insane?"

"It's my genes." She smiled briefly, before turning serious. "No, really, Dom… We can trust her. Do you really think I would have brought her here without knowing that we are safe with her?"

Dom shook his head slowly. "Please don't say you told her…"

Kate nodded sheepishly. "I did. And before you freak out – I checked her out."

"I assume you mean that in a different way than what 'm thinking right now."

She rolled her eyes. "She's like us."

"Dysfunctional?"

"She's a fugitive. She cut the brakes off her stepdad's car and killed him. She's been on the run for a long time." Kate smiled. "She's smart."

Dom snorted. He ran his hand through his hair. This was not his sister. Not suspicious, shady Kate would trust someone so much just after a couple of weeks. But here she was, with… Kay something, expecting him to suddenly greet her with open arms.

You got tired of each other, being so close for a long time. Being around someone 24/7. And when that someone was your sibling that only got a hundred times worse. So of course they argued, and needed breaks from each other with promises that they would never ever want to see the other again. But they always reunited after a few days or so. And he'd waited, quite patiently actually for Kate to come back. And he was glad she did – hell, he would've hugged her if it weren't for the little runaway she'd brought with her.

When Dom brought chicks back with him he at least had the decency to warn her first. And he did not go and tell them that he was a murderer on the run from the law – unless they were into that kind of thing.

"Not smart enough to get away with it," he retorted.

"Neither did you, actually," said the Kay something girl.

Kate's face shone up again at the sight of that… woman. Like she was some freaking prophet that was going to save her from all her sins.

Yup, it was official. His sister had been brainwashed. And if she expected that that chick would stick around, then she was wrong.

"Get out!" he snarled.

Kate actually gasped, like she was any shocked by it. What the hell had she expected?

The woman blinked, looking extremely uncomfortable. "All right."

Kate reached out for her. "Kay –"

"No, it's all right, Kate." She smiled. "I didn't expect to stay. Nice meeting you, though, really." Her smile turned nervous, and all the confidence he'd first seen in her was gone, her mask slipping off. "Can't say the same for your brother, because you got severe trust issues. Kind of like me. Anyway, would really appreciate it if you wouldn't call the cops on me. Not that I think you would but – you know, wanna make sure and stuff. So, yeah. Bye. Uh, goodbye." She stood awkwardly by the door, and then ran out into the rain.

And so he got rid of her.

Kate looked like she was about to go after her, but Dom grabbed her arm. "Don't."

"Why not?"

"'Cause it's you and me. We run. Together. Never anyone else, right?"

The door opened behind them, and in stumbled the Kay chick. She was blinking rapidly, panting. "I came back."

They stared at her.

"There are cops outside and they don't look so happy."

Despite clearly disliking her, Dom had to say Kay was good at running too.

----

"I – I think that was a tree. That fell down. You know bolts and stuff they struck trees right? And uh, there's fire, right? So I really do believe we should head back unless we want to die from a forest fire." Zidler forget to mention that it was raining a freaking waterfall down on them and that would pretty much put out any fire. "I hear they spread quickly."

Both Zidler and Wendy jumped when they heard something that sounded very much like a tree giving in and falling from their left.

Wendy came back to life the quickest and set off, in a faster pace than before. Somehow managing to run through the rain and the branches sticking them everywhere and the stones just waiting to make Zidler fall over them and cut up his skin.

"WENDY!" he yelled desperately.

"GO AWAY!" Wendy screamed. And he had lost her again in the maze of the jungle.

"Come on! Let's go back!" Zidler begged, ducking under a branch. "It's suicide out here!"

She had to be acting this way because of trauma or something. But she would get better. Libby had said that, give her time. She'll talk. And she had started to talk to him, and she had smiled a little more, and now _this._

"WENDY!"

--

Margo looked out at the beach again. The rain was falling even harder now, and she could hear and see branches crack and fall in the jungle.

She squinted at the camp. There was a tight know in her stomach. It was of worry for Zidler and Wendy, both weren't back yet but it was for someone else also. And then she remembered the reason why.

"I'll be right back," she told Rose who only looked mildly surprised when she went out in the rain.

She found him trying to take cover under the lonely tree. But the branches were thin and the leaves gave under from the water. He looked like a drenched cat, and a sort of mother instinct Margo didn't know she had kicked in.

"You're drowning!" she yelled, and Fred looked up, looking very small and sad.

"Illogical. We're on land," he said it with such defeat that Margo couldn't help but feel even more sorry for him.

She took his hand and nudged him up on his feet. "We're all taking cover in the church!"

"I know," he replied solemnly. He couldn't see much through his glasses Margo realized, with the rain and all. So she took a better grip around his hand and led him carefully toward the church.

"I – uh –" he protested weakly. But Margo dragged him in there anyway.

He took off his glasses when they were inside. The sound of the storm was still as loud as if they were in it. But there were no raindrops falling down on them. She hoped he couldn't see all the blaming and glaring eyes turned to them now.

"What the hell is he doing here?"

Margo ignored Neil, Andrea, Bonnie and everyone else and sat down next to him in one of the corners. Fred was just looking down, and she could see that the top of his ears were red, as his cheeks.

She bit her lip and drew her knees up to her chest. She hoped Zidler would be back soon.

--

Zidler had caught up to Wendy, but Wendy was still several steps before him. He had no idea where they were. And even if she agreed to come back to the camp with him, he wasn't sure exactly where the camp was.

"Wendy…" he begged uselessly again, a tired repeat of the same words over and over. "I promise not to bother you with any more magic tricks if you will just wait!"

To his surprise, she stopped in her tracks and spun around. He felt slightly offended for a moment that that was what it took to make her stop.

"DID YOU SEE IT?" she screamed.

"What?"

She raised her hands in the air, and she screamed again, desperate, "DID YOU SEE IT? THE MONSTER?"

Zidler knew what it was all about. He shook his head. She let her hands fall to her side in defeat.

"I heard it!" she shouted. She covered her mouth with her hand, choking back a sob.

At that he nodded. "Me too! But Wendy, this –" he waved around at the trees, surrounding the clearing they were standing in "– this doesn't change anything! Okay? Blaming yourself –"

"You don't understand!" she screamed. "I'm not blaming myself for his death! There was nothing I could've done!" She closed her eyes, forcing away furious tears.

"He told me to run so I – I ran," she said, calmer, "I ran the fastest I could and I didn't look back. But it's not my fault. I know that. I know it isn't. But that doesn't change how I feel, okay? This…" She looked down at the bright green grass that reached up to their knees. "This is where his heart stopped to beat."

Zidler took a step forward. "Let's go back. Why can't we go back?"

"The sun was shining when he died."

"Wendy… come on."

"And I – I begged to him to _please _don't die_."_

"Wendy –"

Wendy screamed. Zidler leaped forward and avoided getting hit by the falling tree. The sky thundered and he clung onto Wendy, barely processing how close he'd been to be crushed.

"Fell down… just like… just like…" Wendy's eyes were huge in horror. Zidler took her arm, hard.

"We have to get out of here."

Wendy nodded absently, staring at the massive broken tree.

--

Ellie was curled up to a little ball beside Andrea. "I miss dad," she whispered, turning her face away.

"He misses you too. And what he wants most in the world is to find you." Andrea kissed the top of her head. "Okay?"

Ellie nodded. "Okay."

Andrea looked around at the people squished inside the church. It wasn't the biggest of places, but many were missing. She had wanted to go and look after Kim, but she'd stayed for Ellie's sake.

Ellie, despite the rumbling from the sky outside, was drifting off. And Andrea took out the ledger, and some of the notes she'd stolen from Fox. With the death of that Other, Karl, he'd seemed to have forgotten all about it.

She expected everyone else to be too busy with them to pay any attention to her, but to her surprise she saw Phelps staring at the ledger from the place he was sitting. She tried to ignore him and in the end she slammed the book shut.

"What?" she hissed.

The buzz from the survivors almost drowned what he was saying. "Is that Latin?"

Andrea considered lying – but there was nothing really to lie about. "Yes."

"You know that, uh, Latin?"

Andrea shook her head slowly. "I don't. Do you?"

"I'm a botanist. I know… a little. Kind of. Very, very little."

Andrea frowned, but waved him over. "Take a look then."

--

"Let me guess," Kate said, raising a finger to her lips, laughter in her voice, "you had another fight."

Kaylee sighed. And Kate smiled when she realized she had been right. But despite the grin, Kay knew Kate felt as worried she was.

"And now he's wandering around in the rain in anger because of that. Now, when has this happened before?"

Millions of times, but Kay wasn't ready to give up so easily. "Not in a storm."

"It's not that bad."

At that the tarp gave in.

Kay spat the water out of her mouth. They were all soaked and she sky thundered above. Kate was tangled in the mess but Kay got quickly up.

She, Desmond and Bonnie went outside to try to tie it up again. But with the rain and the wind it would only buy them some more time before it went down again.

"Maybe we can go to the caves!" Kate suggested when they were inside, and hope rose inside of Kay. Maybe Dom was there.

Bonnie shook her head. "Not in this weather."

"Aye," Desmond agreed, "we have to wait for it to calm down."

"Will it ever?" Lori asked.

"So we wait." Andrea went back to her side by Ellie.

Kay looked at Kate. She shrugged and sat down too.

Waiting.

----

She couldn't blame it on being drunk. She couldn't blame it on him. It was only her.

He cradled her head in his hands, and the kiss became almost chaste, something lingering, something sweet. She wrapped her arms around him, tried to deepen the kiss. Make it something else. Blame it on something. She wanted to have an excuse. But there was no reason but that Kaylee wanted to kiss Dom.

He took off her jacket. She took off his. Kate was still out… somewhere. And she could be back any second. They both knew that. But none of them would stop. There was a battle in her mind, she should stop now. She should push him away. But she didn't.

There were several things that have lead to this. There was that feeling you got after escaping the marshal all the time, almost like you'd escaped death. And the way Dom looked at her, stared. The fact that she was getting very much attached to the both of them. To Kate like a sister… to Dom like something else.

Everything should be disappearing. It should only be them left in the world. There should only be Dom. Dom's eyes. Dom's skin. Dom's lips. But it wasn't like that.

"Wanted this… for so long…" And Dom kissed her again. But it didn't sound like Dom. It sounded like Peter. The first time he'd sent her to her room – her mother gone – and he'd closed the door behind him and slowly walked toward her.

She pushed him away. "DON'T!" She saw only a flash of Dom's surprised face before she punched him.

She realized what she'd done. Too late to change anything.

Kate stood at the door, shocked.

----

"Down here!" Zidler shouted. Wendy stumbled down the slope, at the end of it there was a small cave. They huddled together under it, knees drawn up to their chests to make room.

"I'm sorry," Wendy said after a while.

Zidler looked out at the rain. "It's okay. We're all a bit crazy."

"Yeah, but… I'm _more_ crazy. Crazier."

"Well, you've been through –"

"It's not that." Wendy shook her head, and tucked a strand of wet hair behind her ear. "Before – when I was younger, my mother wanted to test me. See if I was sane or not. I was going through these periods when I would just talk like crazy and freak out and then go mute."

"But you're… you're talking now."

Wendy looked at him seriously. "I'm talking to _you_."

Zidler frowned; he didn't understand what she meant. "And… I'm talking to… you."

She rolled her eyes and bumped his shoulder. He grinned, because in that way he could pretend that they were having a lovely time. And that the roof of the small little cave – more like hole – wouldn't cave in at any second.

"You love Margo, right?"

"W-what?" The question took him completely by surprise and he gaped at her.

"Margo told the truth when I was – when I was gone. And… and you… after she told the truth you got together with her. You're still with her even though she's having a baby that isn't yours."

"Well," Zidler looked down, "it doesn't feel like that."

When he looked up Wendy was smiling, and he could see a glimpse of the old Wendy in there, his friend. "You'll be a great dad, you know."

They were silent, listening to the falling rain. Zidler closed his eyes.

Wendy grabbed his arm and he opened them.

"Do you hear something?"

"You mean except for the thundering sky and the rain?"

"Listen!" She looked up and Zidler did the same.

"Hey guys."

Wendy yelped. Charlie was standing outside, peering in. "I'm absolutely overjoyed that I'm not the last person on earth."

They had to make room for him as he crept in between them. Wendy looked like she was getting crushed and Charlie didn't look too comfortable either.

"You didn't find your guitar?"

Charlie shook his head. "Nah. But as soon as the rain eases I'll be right back out there again. It'll survive. It got lots of strength."

Zidler saw Wendy raise her eyebrows beside Charlie and he smiled.

Zidler broke the silence by saying, "Isn't this cozy?"

Both of them ignored him.

--

They had gone to the caves to get water. Now there was practically a flood outside.

"Where do you think everyone else is taking cover?" Kim asked Fox. They were sitting close together in one of the caves. They could hear the rain falling distantly.

Fox shrugged.

"Water?" Kim joked and held out a water bottle.

"No thanks." Fox smiled though.

They both went silent again. There weren't much to do. They had played 20 questions and ironically the famous 'What would you bring to an island?' game.

"It's sad," Kim sighed.

"W-what?"

She shrugged. "It's sad that the casino is gone. The one Margo and Zidler built. Everything must have… washed away."

Fox nodded slowly. Then he laughed.

"What?" Kim asked as Fox continued to laugh, it was a good sound. He hadn't been happy in a while. She shuddered involuntarily at the thought of Karl, but pushed those thoughts away. He was gone, but Wendy was back and that was a good thing.

"I… I just… We should t-try to save it."

"What?" Kim smiled nervously. "Seriously?"

Fox stood up and held out his hand for her to take it. "V-very seriously."

Kim laughed too and with Fox's help she stood up. She knew there was a storm raging, but it couldn't be that bad, could it? And they'd been though a lot of rainfalls during the time they'd been on the island.

Kim looked up; her hand was still in Fox's. "Did you hear that?"

"What?"

Dust fell from the roof and Kim knew one second too late what was about to happen.

The cave roof collapsed in on them.

--

The wind tugged at his clothes. And it was dangerous – walking out there on the beach – with branches and other things flying through the air, with the rain whipping at his face.

The water was licking at the first set of shelter and tents. Most of them were broken, trashed by the rain and the wind. But one was still standing, Owen's was still standing.

Dom knew that, because in his hand he held a bottle of wine he'd taken from it just a moment ago. He put a hand to his temple, stopping in his tracks and he looked down, frustrated.

Kaylee was mad at him, as usual. Kate was slowly recovering, but she was patient. Everyone else was too deep in their own problems to care or notice his.

"Just you and me, huh?" he said to the bottle, but his words got lost in the thunder. He leant his back against a tree and bent until he sat down.

He knew nothing would happen to him. Though he hoped –prayed something would.

--

Wendy was silent. Charlie was humming and Zidler was currently ranting to them about his sister Hazel who said seriously a lot.

Their feet were wet; the rain was falling too fast for the earth to take it up. And it was only a matter of time before they had to find a new place to take cover in.

"What was that?" Charlie asked, and Zidler stopped talking.

"What?"

A tree fell down over the entrance. Dirt fell down on them. Charlie spit it out from his mouth. But the roof hadn't collapsed, not yet.

Then they heard the loud clanking noise. Charlie had heard that sound before.

"It's…" Zidler started but Charlie hushed him. They all already knew it was the monster.

Suddenly Wendy pushed Charlie to the side and crawled out from the hole.

"Wendy!" Zidler yelled. "What the – come back!"

Wendy disappeared into the jungle. Zidler struggled up on his feet and ran after her.

Charlie stayed there for a while. The monster's noises had faded away. But Zidler and Margo didn't return.

"I guess I'm going too, then." Charlie sighed and followed after them.

--

"WENDY!" Zidler was desperate to catch up to her. She was running towards the sound of the monster instead of away from it. And Zidler's last encounter with it had ended with burying Eko underneath a big ship in the middle of the jungle. He begged for Wendy to stop, but either she didn't hear him over the storm or didn't care.

And then she disappeared.

He spun around, but he couldn't see her anywhere. All he could see were trees, trees and even more trees. Above him the sky lightened up again.

"WENDY!" He started to run again, but he had no idea where he was going. He darted blindly over a rock and between two massive trees. When he stepped out, he was on grass.

In the middle of the clearing stood Wendy. But she wasn't alone.

She was staring into the eye of the monster.

It was a large form of black smoke, hovering in the air. It flashed just like the sky did from its bolts. Wendy was wide-eyed. Still as a statue.

The smoke slowly turned away until it quickly disappeared into the jungle.

Zidler was completely frozen. Barely registering what'd happened before him. It was too surreal. He blinked and came back to life. He was just in time to catch Wendy in his arms when she fell.

Then they heard Charlie scream.

--

The sky was darkening.

"Maybe they've taken cover at the caves," Margo heard someone mumble. The rain continued to tap against the tarp, but it didn't sound as violent now. She stood up and made her way between the survivors until she was out of the church.

She'd barely taken a step out in the rain when someone grabbed her arm.

"What are you doing?" It was Bonnie.

"I'm gonna look after Zidler of course," Margo answered her like it was the most obvious thing in the world. As it should be.

Bonnie arched her eyebrows. "Zidler is fine."

"No he isn't!" Margo objected. "We – he always gets into trouble!"

It was true. But Bonnie didn't seem ready to admit that. "Come inside. Now."

"Give me one good reason."

"Well, you're pregnant for a start," Bonnie said with eerily calm. "And you got asthma. There's a monster out in the jungle. And you're the only one that freighter guy trusts. At least think of the baby."

All those things Bonnie had counted up only made Margo angrier. But yet she stayed and fought. "Without Zidler –"

"Oh, don't become one of those women!" Bonnie whined. "Go inside now. Aaron needs someone to take care of him."

So just because I'm the one knocked up I'm supposed to take care of all the kids? Margo wanted to yell. But Bonnie's eyes looked past hers and widened in surprise.

Margo whirled around, taking a step back.

"Sawyer!" she shouted happily. Bonnie just stared at Sawyer who marched towards them in long steps.

He didn't say anything until he reached up to them. He didn't hesitate at all when he leaned forward and pressed his and Bonnie's lips together in a kiss.

"You mean women in love?" Margo shouted. But none of them seemed to notice.

--

"I think – I think it was from there?"

"Really?" Wendy looked up at him. Her eyes were wide and she looked scared.

Zidler shook his head, turning around. "No."

"Come on." Wendy grabbed his hand, and together they ran towards where they've thought they'd heard Charlie scream. Millions of scenarios went through Zidler's head of what could've happened. They were lucky any more trees didn't fall down on their path. The wind blew harder but the raindrops were less and they could see better.

"Look!" Wendy tugged at his arm and he swung around. She pointed at something between two black rocks. As they got closer Zidler could see that it was a person.

Wendy sat down on her knees and put her hand on his face. "Charlie?" she said tentatively. There was a cut on his forehead but he wasn't bleeding too much.

"Charlie – buddy," Zidler tried to wake him up. They were both too scared to check if he was breathing or not.

Charlie's eyes flew open. Wendy laughed in relief when he started to cough. He sat up and Zidler patted him on the back.

"What happened?" he asked hoarsely.

"We don't know." Zidler glanced at Wendy.

Charlie touched his temple and saw the blood on his fingers.

"We have to get out of here," Zidler said, looking up at the dark sky before he and Wendy helped Charlie up on his feet.

--

Charlie was unusually fine. He paid absolutely no more attention to the wound on his forehead anymore on their journey through the jungle.

"Finally!" Zidler exclaimed happily when there was roof over their heads. He'd never been happier to see the caves before.

Wendy walked up to the small stream and drank, as if they hadn't had enough of the water. She suddenly looked up at something Zidler didn't see.

He frowned and walked over to her. She tugged at his arm and pointed.

Zidler followed her gaze and saw stones, dirt and grit spread out. They both rose and followed it. A cave had collapsed in. Stones were blocking the entrance but there was a small hole, Wendy peered into it.

Zidler was just about to scream for Charlie when they heard a small whimper.

"Is there someone there?" Zidler yelled.

He got another whine for an answer.

"Who is it?" Wendy screamed. They heard Charlie's steps behind them but none of them cared to turn around.

"What's going on?" he asked.

"K-Kim!" the small voice moaned in pain.

"Okay, Kim. We're gonna get you out of there! So... are you okay?"

Charlie and Wendy immediately began to dig. Kim didn't answer.

--

Many questions were shot at Sawyer, but he didn't answer any until he got some food. "It ain't exactly been a walk in the park," he explained to those who scowled. "Try making your own way here through fallin' trees and the apocalypse!"

When he was finished, he sat down beside Lori. "What'd ya tell them?" he asked.

"Not enough," Lori answered shortly. "Where were you kept?"

"Somewhere far, far away from you."

"How did you get here?" Lori asked.

"Same way you did, Pixie. By boat. That's the only way isn't it?"

"What happened? Did Jack make a deal? Got you out?" Andrea asked.

Sawyer laughed joylessly. "The doc made no deal. I escaped all by myself. Right outta that Bug-Eyed leader's hands. Saw none of you. Didn't hear anything about O'Donnell or anybody else. Stole a boat, boat broke down under storm and I even made it home for dinner."

There was not like they could ask for any privacy, Andrea thought. Inquire more and more information from him. He would maybe say more it they weren't in front of kids and persons he didn't trust – well, Sawyer didn't exactly trust anyone.

"But what about Florence Bluth?"

Andrea looked up and saw Fred, he was standing and staring at Sawyer.

Sawyer raised his eyebrows. "Who the hell are you?"

"Come on," Bonnie said, glancing from one to the other, "let's talk outside." She and Sawyer went out from the church and immediately everyone began to whine and complain.

Ellie who had been woken up by Sawyer's arrival closed her eyes again, leaning her head on Andrea's shoulder.

Fred sat down beside her again, shoulders slumped.

"Nobody will tell me anything." He turned a page of the ledger.

Andrea blinked. "Florence Bluth was one of us survivors."

He looked up.

"She lived on this side of the island. Until she left on a raft they'd built. Then the Others came on a boat, they took Flor and they took a boy named Walt from his father and blew the raft up. Michael – Walt's dad left to search for his son. Many, many days later Flor and he returned. So one day, two women were shot and killed down at the hatch. They said it was one of the Others who did it. But you know what? It was them." Andrea looked at Lori sitting next to Desmond. "Now you might know why we don't talk about it much."

Fred looked down at the ledger again, he shook his head.

"You don't believe me?" Andrea asked tiredly.

"I don't believe you." He said it with so much certainty, that Andrea didn't bother to argue.

They didn't talk anymore. And after a while Andrea fell asleep too.

Then Fred ripped out several notes out of the ledger and put them inside his pocket.

--

"Kim!" Wendy yelled, having finally stopped her silence.

"She's not shouting anymore," Zidler pointed out, even though it was obvious.

"Perhaps she's just resting," Charlie said. He hadn't even broken any sweat from carrying away all the stones. Zidler was already feeling like his arms would fall off any second.

"I think I can fit in there," Wendy said, resting her hand on a stone. They'd dug a small hole through the rubble. And Wendy had started talking again – Charlie hadn't even looked surprised at hearing her voice.

Zidler shook his head. "You'll get stuck."

Wendy glared at him. "I'm not that big!"

"I – I…" Zidler stammered. Wendy rolled her eyes and carefully crawled into the hole. Dust fell down on her and she coughed.

"Can't see a thing," Wendy mumbled.

"Are you sure you're okay?" Zidler called after her.

"Yeah, sure I'm fine –" Wendy screamed. Dirt fell down from the roof above her.

"Wendy – Wendy get out!"

But it was too late. The tunnel collapsed and Zidler was coughing from the dust, and Wendy was trapped inside.

--

Bonnie looked around; the wind wasn't blowing as hard as before and maybe they could move to the caves soon. She turned to Sawyer. "So, want to tell me why you're lying to me?"

Sawyer smiled. "I'm not lying to you, Princess. I'm lying to everybody else."

"Why?" Bonnie wasn't mad yet. She was still so relieved that he had returned.

Sawyer nodded at the church. "Who's that Harry Potter guy?"

Bonnie crossed her arms. "He says he's from the freighter. We're not exactly best buddies with him considering who the last Frederic Phelps was."

Sawyer raised his eyebrows. "As you should be."

"So," Bonnie said seriously, "tell me the truth."

Sawyer heaved a sigh. "It was Flor."

Bonnie tried not to look too surprised. She swallowed and waited for him to go on.

"She and this other chick, Janna, barged into the room where they were keeping me. Of course the first thing that happened was me being held at gunpoint – but soon we all escaped together. Wasn't easy, but this Janna girl… She's somethin' special. In the escapee-from-mental- institution way. So as soon we got to that other island, as soon as we didn't need her anymore – Flor knocked her out. Turns out that she stole some very important documents, maps, information – the whole thing. So… I let Flor go."

"I expect… this is all a part of a big master plan?"

Sawyer curved his lips up in a smirk. "You have no idea."

--

**Author's Notes:** It's Wednesday. But I have a very good reason for this late update. It involves hippies and Lost. The hippies are my class. We had our final school shooting, and since my class is AWESOME at making decision we chose hippie-theme like the day before the shoot! So when I was supposed to update I was running around the city and home trying to find something resembling hippie clothing, 'cause apparently dad was sleeping in the seventies and my mother was in Peru and there they had other problems. So anyway, at the time I was home my internet had shut off and there was no way for me to update. Sorry! And sorry for the rant! If you read it! But – I did have LOST related stuff on my hippie clothing, because I'm one of those very crazy obsessed fans – I wrote _Not Penny's Boat_ on my hand and had a dharma necklace and went around saying Peace & Namaste all day. It was awesome.

This chapter has been split into two parts, it was shorter in the outline but when I started writing it I realized there was no way I would fit everything in one chapter. So the next part will be out on Tuesday – even though Lost isn't on then. I think. I'm in denial.

Thank you so much for your incredible reviews! I'm really thankful for them! You're great.

Namaste.


	43. A Mystery, Part 2

_A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,  
Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would control,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
For that bright hope at last  
And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

* * *

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 35, A Mystery, Part 2 **

* * *

Kaylee had believed in happily ever after once, when she was a child, when her real father had been alive. She's heard the fairytales, and she'd believed them, until her older brother Aiden had told her in that brotherly 'I know better than you' way, of the real stories, of the real grim and bloody endings and that most of those tales she's been told from young years ended very tragically.

She remembered when her mom had called Peter her father. It hadn't been a grand moment, they'd been having dinner. Kaylee had been quiet, moping over the bunch of homework that had to be done, and her bother kept pinching her to annoy her. And her mom had said, carelessly, not stammer and absolutely no hint that she even felt something: "Your father will be home soon. Work's running late, so don't worry."

Aiden had of course noticed. He'd stopped irritate Kaylee abruptly to stare at their mother. Kaylee had continued to eat her food in the same pace as before, but she was burning of anger inside. It felt like her mother had stolen something from her.

Peter wasn't her real father. Happily ever after wasn't real. Neither was the calm, quiet, emotionless mask she put on that day.

The storm was calming down. Phelps mentioned something about the storm's eye. Bonnie looked to see that everyone was there (they weren't, but they were enough, before she, Locke and Sawyer led the way. Kate squeezed Kaylee's arm and smiled. Some of them stopped for a moment and took a look at their ruined camp.

Margo looked down sadly at the sand. And Kaylee stayed with her, she didn't really know why. But she felt like she had to. They were the last ones to leave into the jungle.

She hadn't had a home in a long time. She'd forgotten what it felt like. But it somehow felt like she'd lost the place where she belonged.

It wasn't a house with a white picket fence, it wasn't exactly a hotel resort – but they'd all built it together. And it had all washed away so quickly.

Kaylee was used to losing things. So she glanced at Kate who looked over her shoulder at her, and she moved on.

* * *

"We need to – we need to…" Zidler ran around, trying to move stones there and trying to find passages there. Wendy was trapped inside. Maybe worse. He swallowed, pushing away that thought.

Zidler stopped in his tracks. "Maybe we can… I don't know…" He looked up. "Maybe… we can dig! Like – dig! In the earth… but caves are stones… can't dig through stone…" Zidler looked devastated again.

Charlie just sat by the stream, his hands clasped together, eyes looking forward without any emotion in them.

"WENDY!" Zidler shouted again.

Wendy couldn't hear him. She was too deep in. She coughed, her feet were trapped under a stone but her arms were free. She pulled at her leg, grounding her teeth and trying not to scream in pain.

_Don't panic. Don't think of Karl. Don't think of death. Don't think of fear. Don't think. _

Wendy cried out, unable to hold it in when she got her foot loose from underneath the rock.

"H-Hello?"

Wendy turned her head. But it was too dark for her to see. She wandered with her hands over the stones. "Kim?"

"F-Fox."

"Are you okay?"

"Y-Yeah. Got… my arm… is t-trapped." He coughed again, dragging a rattled breath through his lungs.

"Where are you? Keep talking. I can follow the sound of your voice." Wendy closed her hands into fists, fighting against the pain and she slowly crawled forward.

"I – Kim – she – I think she m-might be b-buried… what i-if she's…"

Wendy wanted to tell him to shut up. Stop saying those things. Kim was okay.

But in reality – Kim probably wasn't.

There was so much blood.

She blinked. There weren't anything. She was lying to herself.

"What happened?" she asked, and her hand found his.

"We – we were hiding f-from the rain… a-and the cave just c-collapsed…"

"This is your hand, right?" Wendy asked abruptly.

"Yeah."

She smiled in the dark. It would've been a nightmare if it hadn't been his.

"Don't worry," she said. "Zidler and Charlie are right outside. They're gonna get us out of here. You, me and Kim."

"R-Right."

"Now I'm gonna try to get your arm loose, okay? So, uh. Be still."

* * *

Kaylee saw him out of the corner of her eyes. No one had noticed him. But she could see him through the small rain, between the trees.

Kate had seen him too. She took a step towards his way but Kay put a hand on her arm.

"I can talk to him."

Kate looked from her to Dom in the distance. "All right."

Nobody else noticed when she trailed behind, and with one last glance at the group she hurried into the trees.

He looked up and saw her coming. He chuckled to himself before he lowered his eyes.

There was an empty liquor bottle in his hand.

"Come on," Kay said, standing before him, "we're all heading to the caves."

Dom was silent. She didn't say a word. After awhile he looked up at her again.

"That's it?"

"Do you want me to start yelling at you?" She clasped her hands together. "Oh, Dom. I was so, so worried. You could've gotten hurt. Maybe I should scream at you and run off without telling anyone where I went."

"Spitefulness does not suit you." Dom stood up. His voice was little slurry, and he was swaying slightly on the spot. "And I know you were worried."

Kay shook her head and crossed her arms. "Of course I was," she confessed. "Did you really think otherwise?"

Dom smiled, but it wasn't happy one and pointed a finger at her. "With you, Evans, you never know."

* * *

"I haven't been useless."

Lori and Desmond had been silent for most of the way to the caves. But as they created a distance between themselves and the survivors she spoke up.

She knew he was looking at her. She could feel it. She could feel too much these days.

"What do you mean?"

Lori shrugged, even though she knew exactly what she meant. "Nothing."

"Don't do that."

"Do what?" And she'd might have snapped, but she couldn't control anything anymore.

Desmond exhaled deeply. "I want to know what happened to ya, Lori. You're different."

"Well, you haven't been around for years. A lot happened in that time. And I didn't have that much contact with Penny," she lied.

"I have already talked about Penny with Andy. I want to know about _you_."

"As I said," she picked up her pace, "a lot's happened."

Desmond grabbed her arm, stopped her from walking further.

"But I'm still your brother. And you're still my little sis." He released his grip, it had been gentle. But Lori had felt weak. "We're here now. At your caves."

* * *

"Zidler!" Margo shouted.

He turned around. His face was sooty and his clothes were plastered to his body from the rain. When he saw her he smiled brokenly, looking sad. She threw her arms around him, hugging him closely because he was fine. He was okay.

She opened her eyes and looked over his shoulder. "Why…" They pulled away from each other. "Why are all those stones… rubble…?"

"Wendy." Zidler swallowed. "They're trapped – I – we – Kim and Fox were inside and we tried to get them out but then it collapsed again and…"

"Everyone!" Andrea shouted, and Margo turned to look at her. She looked frightened, but there was determination in her voice. "Kim, Fox and Wendy are all trapped inside the collapsed cave! Okay, we gotta get them out. Anyone know anything about structure? We can't risk the roof falling in on us!"

"I might be able to help," Desmond said.

Andrea nodded. "Okay. Everyone who can, come and help us."

Zidler followed Andrea. Margo turned around.

Fred was standing at the entrance of the cave, looking sad.

"Come on," Margo said, "you heard her."

Together they ran after to help.

* * *

"I don't this is a good idea." Dom leaned back against a tree. "The caves. Let's go back to the camp instead."

"There is no camp to go back to, Dom." He didn't look that surprised at her words. Kay took a step to stand beside him. "We should go before it starts to rain so horribly again."

Dom looked up at the sky. "It'll pass."

This was somehow much more frightening than when he screamed at her.

She tugged at his arm. "Come on." She started to walk before him through the forest.

Then she noticed he wasn't following her.

She whirled around, ready to snap at him when she saw that he was still looking up at the sky. Small drops of rain fell down on his face and almost made it look like he was crying. But he wasn't _looking._

"Dom…" Kay said, feeling her fear rise as he just kept his head high. He didn't even blink. He looked pale like gray ash and the rain started to fall more.

She waited. She watched.

He blinked and turned to look at her, startled to see her. "I'm…" He sounded so broken.

The sky thundered again. And she hoped he couldn't see her shivering, that the paleness of her own skin was because of the blue from the downfall and not from fear.

"Just… let's go back."

They would figure it out. Together.

.

* * *

.

A blonde chick got eaten by a slimy monster, and all was right in the world.

Dom chuckled at the screen, where the hero was currently miserably failing at denying his love for the female counterpart. Didn't matter anyway, he'd seen the movie before and knew that the only survivor was the hero's hot cousin.

Kaylee and Kate were out doing whatever it was female fugitives on the run did for fun. He was enjoying getting to watch horror movies without Kate making gagging noises and Kaylee pointing out all the obvious mistakes and plot holes. It wasn't the story that was important in Dom's opinion; it was the question of how many people the murderer could kill before the idiots noticed.

He didn't even get afraid when Kate stormed into the room, just as the sky thundered outside and the murderer killed the hero's chick with a knife through the gut.

"'Sup?" he said, not turning his eyes from the screen. Then he noticed that Kaylee wasn't with her.

He turned the TV off and turned to look at his sister.

"The marshal got her."

.

* * *

.

"You're a scientist, right?" Wendy whispered in the dark. She heard Fox shift – as best as he could clamped in there between the stones.

"Yes."

"How long do you think it will take for the air to, you know, run out?"

Fox was silent for a long moment. She could hear him breathe slower. "Not long," he answered finally.

They both turned quiet again. Wendy couldn't hear anyone digging on the other side – but the tunnel had been long. And they were deep underground, she supposed. She didn't really know. But she knew at least for sure Zidler wouldn't give up on them.

"He's coming," Wendy said, and she rested her head on a stone, and she waited, and she hoped.

* * *

"Andy," Ellie said in a small voice. The rain had started to pound outside again, water dripped from the ceiling and onto the people working on digging though the collapsed cave.

Andrea wiped the sweat off her forehead. "Can't talk now, honey."

"But it's _im_portant." Ellie got back that hint of small child annoyance in her voice. "It's about Charlie."

"Mhmm." Andrea was busy carrying away another rock. "Go talk to Margo."

Ellie pouted, crossed her arms and looked like she was about to argue when the sky thundered and lit up. She looked scared and ran off.

"Careful!" Desmond warned. "Dig here now. Don't want put pressure there, aye?"

Andrea accepted the water she got from Jin and drank.

* * *

"We're here," Kaylee said, smiling, looking at the caves. And it was just in time too. Soon they wouldn't have been able to walk through the ever growing storm.

Her eyes widened when they entered. She saw people desperately working by one of the caves – hauling and carrying rocks away. And then she turned from surprise to shock when she saw Sawyer with the people working.

"You're back!" Kate happily threw her arms around Dom, hugging him tightly. She pulled away, looking like she was considering hitting him on the arm, but changing her mind when she saw his expression.

"What's going on?" Kaylee asked worriedly.

Kate looked over her shoulder. "The cave collapsed. Kim, Fox and Wendy are trapped inside."

"What?" Kaylee gasped.

"And… Sawyer's back."

Kay turned to Dom, to see his reaction. But Dom was turning his head in every direction, looking for something.

Kate frowned, noticing his strange behavior. "Dom, what is it?"

Dom linked, and looked down. "Uh, nothin'. Gotta go and help." He walked away from them, without a glance Kaylee's way over to the collapsed cave.

Kate looked after him, concern in her eyes before she turned back to Kaylee. "What happened out there? Did he fall and hit his head?"

Kaylee shrugged, but she bit her lip in worry. "You tell me."

* * *

"What's that?" Wendy asked, dust fell down on her and she walls were shaking and it was the cave collapsing all over again. She heard Fox whimper in fear beside her and she, despite the pain in her body pressed herself up against the gritty walls.

The shaking stopped. She wiped away the dirt from her face, panting slightly.

Then something wet fell down on her.

She looked up. Another drop of water fell down on her cheek.

"We… we must be closer."

"W-What?"

Wendy raised a hand until she had it pressed against the earth above them.

"The water is dripping down in here – must mean the ground – the air is closer. Maybe we can dig our way through."

"I – I can't. My arm…"

"We have to. Use your other hand, okay? We have to get out." She turned her eyes towards where she thought he was. "So – so we can help Kim."

Fox was silent for a long moment. Then he said, "Okay."

* * *

"What happened?" Lori asked when Desmond seated himself beside her.

"The cave… it shook… we had to stop. If we dig more – then it could collapse again – on us and them."

"Didn't know you were a construction worker," Lori said a bit bitterly. "I learn new things every day."

"Lori…"

Lori snapped her head around, her dark hair falling behind her shoulders. "What, Des?" she snapped.

"I – I'm sorry."

Lori turned her head down, fingered on the sleeve of her shirt. "For what?"

"For everything. For leaving you. For leaving Penny, but – what's done is done. There's no changing that. We're here now. Together. And some way we will get off this island. And you can't, you can't be angry at me forever, sis."

"Yes I can," Lori said childishly, "watch me." She crossed her arms, and turned away from him. Desmond could see his stubborn little sister in there, and even though they weren't happy at the moment – he savored that fact.

"Is this how you want it to be? You can't accept my apology? Aren't you glad – that I'm safe?" The last thing sounded petty, and he knew she was. It would be a lie to say otherwise. But figuring out Lori was a confusing technique, which no one had yet mastered.

"Yeah, sure you're safe," she muttered, and her old Scottish accent shone through. "For now, anyway. But you know what's gonna happen."

"What is?"

"You're gonna abandon me again."

Desmond turned silent, just like Lori. It was like they were both holding their breaths. Lori's hands were shivering, then her shoulders, and the whole her was shuddering. He put an arm around her, and she leaned into the touch.

"I'm not…" Desmond began as a tear rolled down Lori's cheek, "I'm never, ever abandoning you again. I swear."

* * *

Charlie was sitting, cross-legged, hood brought over his head and a sharpie in his hand as he scribbled down words on the stones, the words couldn't be seen, it meant nothing to anyone else but him. It was his mark. His last words. A last song, if you wished.

"He hasn't found his guitar."

Dom looked down at his side and saw Ellie stand there, shoulders slumping when she saw Charlie sit there alone.

"What?" Dom asked, still feeling out of the world.

"He was looking after his guitar since I _accidentally _lost it." Ellie looked up at him with big eyes. "I didn't break it. I sweeaar."

Charlie looked up and met his eyes.

"I'm gonna go and get drunk," Dom said and left.

* * *

A hand pushed its way through the dirt and up in the air and rain above. The hand was followed by another one, and the dirt was dug away and a girl climbed out from b. She spat on the ground, wiping away mud from her face and body. Wendy struggled up on her feet, her brown eyes blinking away tears of pain when she reached down a hand through the hole she'd just come though.

Down underneath them, in the caves, Andrea took up another rock and revealed bloody hand. She screamed and Bonnie, Desmond and others rushed over to her.

Fox, crying out in pain from his arm was helped up on the ground by Wendy. His face was bloody but the rain washed it away. They stayed there, lying on the ground with the wind blowing and the pain scorching through them, too weak to move.

Andrea and Desmond carefully put Kim down on a blanket. Kim was limp, and her face, her arms, her legs were covered in crimson blood.

"C'mon," said Wendy, and she and Fox got up to their feet.

"C'mon," begged Andrea to the unconscious Kim, whose head was lolled to her side and whose eyelids were closed and red.

Wendy and Fox arrived at the entrance of the caves. And Margo was the first to see them, she was panting, holding her belly and couldn't get up to greet them. Jin saw them first and pointed, speaking rapidly to Sun who embraced the both of them.

Lori bent down by Kim's side to help. Andrea glanced up at her, and there was so much fear in her eyes, but Lori could see none of that. It made her swallow, take a deep breath, and take control. There was no reason to panic, because Kim was going to be okay.

* * *

Margo didn't fall asleep. Wendy was slowly breathing at her side, arms curled around her as she slept. Zidler was on the other, protectively holding an arm around over Margo, also asleep. But Margo was not.

In another cave, Andrea begged Kim to wake up. But she didn't. Not until morning.

* * *

She couldn't breathe. Her eyes fluttered open and she wanted to scream for someone to help her but she couldn't. A hand was clasped around hers, and someone was holding her down, was pressing at her chest.

"Kim! Kim!" Kim's eyes focused on Andrea's blue. Andrea was blurry, fading out of the picture and Kim was trying to hold on. She had to tell her, she had to tell her that she couldn't get any air.

She heard Fox, somewhere; maybe it was his hand around hers. He would know. _Help._

"Kim, I need you to focus! Take it slow! Don't panic. Don't panic." Andrea's voice was strong. But it meant nothing. She tried to breathe… air… small air…

"You're going into shock, Kimika! You need to calm down!"

Hot tears ran down her face, into her mouth, mixing salt with the metallic taste of blood. She tried to take a breath, but it was hard, it felt like she had the weight of the world on her chest.

"Good. _Good…_"

* * *

Wendy and Zidler were still sleeping when Margo left them. She steadied herself with a hand on the wall, shivering, before she continued over to Libby.

Libby was washing away the red from Kim's clothes and Margo swallowed at the sight of them, feeling as if she would throw up.

She did just so. Libby turned around as she vomited; she heard some of the survivors whine behind her.

Libby pulled her hair back until she finished. And Margo felt pathetic there with her face bent down and the awful taste in her mouth.

She hadn't realized she was crying until Libby wiped away the tears from her face.

They sat down somewhere away from everyone else.

"I feel very, very sick." It was the understatement of the century. "I can't…" Margo looked down. "I can barely breathe sometimes when I'm lying down…. and I've started to cough and sometimes…" She put a hand over her belly, blinking hard. "There's blood."

"I'm not a fertility doctor." There was something calming about the way she said it.

"I know but – maybe – everything's falling apart and… maybe it's not that I am sick. Maybe it's just in my brain."

"Margo, coughing blood is not something that is in your brain."

Margo laughed nervously. "Can't it be?"

Libby put a hand on her arm, soothingly. "You know what I think? I think you need it to be. I think you want it to be something you're making up. You want to be overreacting. Because otherwise it would mean that there's something wrong with the baby."

Margo looked down. "Well… is there something wrong, then?"

* * *

When Wendy woke up, she was alone. Her hand clenched around the blanket and she laid there with her eyes clothes, trying to fall asleep again. But now when she was awake, the sounds of the survivors, the rain outside made it impossible. She heard Ellie laugh, and that was what made her open her eyes. Because if a child could still be happy, then all was right in the world, at least for one small moment.

"Hey."

Wendy blinked and sat up when she saw Zidler's grinning face in front of her.

She looked around, no one was around but Charlie, and he was busy staring at Kate.

"Uh, hi," she mumbled. She wondered how she looked, but she couldn't look too bad when Zidler was smiling at her like that. But she felt horrible. "How is… how is Kim?"

"She's… all right." The way he said it made Wendy realize she was anything but. "Locke has decided we're moving back to the beach. To get a new fresh start! Even though if another storm comes along we'll end up here anyway, but no one listens to me, so… are you ready? Okay? I and Margo can carry you if you want."

Wendy shook her head slowly, feeling a bit dizzy. "No… no, it's okay."

Zidler helped her stand up despite her words, and she let him. "How's Fox?"

"Extremely worried."

* * *

"I call Owen's place!" Zidler shouted as soon as they were out on the beach. A lot of the survivors groaned and whined in disappointment as Margo and Zidler happily took over the last standing shelter.

Andrea and a few others, like Fox had stayed behind at the caves, Kim wasn't well enough to be moved yet. But the rest of the survivors, tiredly, and not especially enthusiastically, began to put the pieces back together, started to build a home – again.

"You know," Wendy said, looking at the ruined place she'd actually gotten attached too, "I really hope you are here to save us."

She walked away, head bent down.

Fred looked out at the ocean.

* * *

Andrea sat alone by the bonfire. The night had fallen, and the storm clouds were gone and the stars shone for the first time in days. The edges of her sleeves were still dirty with faint traces of blood, but Andrea did nothing to remove the spots. She stared into the flames.

"Hey. Mind if I join you?"

Before she could answer, Bonnie flopped down beside her.

"I would really like to be alone right now."

"Yeah, right. I know." Bonnie still didn't leave. And Andrea forced herself to look at her.

"Is there something you want?"

Bonnie looked down. "I'm leaving," she said simply.

"What?" Andrea said softly, because she must have heard wrong.

But instead Bonnie threw her hair back over her shoulders, and her gaze burned into hers. "Sawyer and I are leaving tonight."

"Why?"

"Because he's absolutely insane and I think he might be right," Bonnie mumbled, more to herself than to Andrea.

"Where are you going?"

Bonnie sighed. "Where do you think?"

"Then… then we're all coming with you."

Bonnie shook her head sadly. "No, you won't."

"We've been training for this!" Andrea yelled.

"Not for this, Andrea. Not for this. Kim – Wendy – everything that's happened has showed everyone just how fragile their own lives are."

"So… you're gonna risk your own lives, then?" Andrea muttered.

"It's what the heroes do."

Bonnie stood up and Andrea was quick to get up too. "Well, I'm coming along!"

"No you're not!"

"Why?"

"Because of Kim," Bonnie snapped. "And because someone got to watch the camp when I'm gone. And because if I don't come back in one week – you'll know what's gone wrong."

Andrea knew Bonnie was right. And there was no way she could stop her from leaving for the Others, because that was what she'd understood from their conversation at least.

"You've finished explaining to Rapunzel?" Sawyer came walking towards them, rifle slung over his back and a smirk on his face. Bonnie rolled her eyes and he handed her a gun.

Andrea rolled her eyes too at the nickname, and in that moment Bonnie smiled. Andrea smiled back.

"Aww, adorable," Sawyer said and put an arm around Bonnie's shoulder. Bonnie glowered at him until he pulled away. "Let's get going then."

When they walked away into the jungle, Sawyer put his arm around Bonnie's shoulders again. She pushed him away and he staggered on his feet. But Andrea could see that they were both laughing.

* * *

Margo and Zidler might have gotten Owen's shelter. But he'd gotten all her booze, and that Dom considered a win.

"Dom?" Ah, it was his little sister. She looked freaked out, not I-just-saw-the-marshal freaked out but more like she was freaked out by her crazy brother, another good thing. "You're drunk."

And today she was playing Captain Obvious. Dom snorted. "Really, Sherlock?"

Kate took his arms, steadying him the best she could. "Let's get you to bed."

"There are no beds," Dom mumbled. "I need to get to Charlie."

"Well," Kate replied, a little out of breath as she struggled with him, "you can talk to him tomorrow."

"Tomorrow will be too late," Dom whined.

* * *

Kate walked away from Dom and the makeshift shelter. Kaylee took one look at her and sighed.

"He's drunk?"

"Really, _really_ drunk."

* * *

"What're you doin' here?"

Kaylee smiled and crawled up beside him. "I'm making sure you don't wander drunk off into the jungle and get shot by an arrow or something like that."

He chuckled. "No yelling?"

"What?" Kaylee asked with the sweet smile still on her face.

"No: 'Don't drink don't drive' speech?"

"I don't see any cars," she replied softly.

Dom leaned forward and tucked a strand of black hair behind her ear.

Her eyes narrowed. She looked down and pulled back slightly. "Don't."

"What?" His eyes were unfocused, but she could see that he was trying to concentrate on her.

"I'm going to pretend everything's okay if you are."

There was a silence between them, full of tension. Kaylee wasn't meeting his gaze, all of the sudden the sand was very interesting.

"You still mad?"

"Why wouldn't I be?" Kaylee hissed.

"'Cause I've done nothin' wrong, sweetheart."

"So, whenever I don't alarm you where I am you can just scream at me and get away with it?"

"Is me being worried about you so freaking awful?"

"Treating me like a porcelain doll –"

"You've already used that metaphor."

"You've seen me escape so many times. You've seen me get shot – stabbed and yet you've acted nothing like this. What's so different? What's so different now?"

"Because you don't get hurt, Kaylee. You get freaking killed!"

Kaylee's eyes turned dark, she shunned away from him, betrayal in her face. "I'll see you."

And she was gone.

* * *

Wendy woke up.

The pain was still there.

The sun blazed.

* * *

Kaylee had found a half-working tent in the jungle, and she was now setting it up for Ellie.

Ellie was playing with two small stones beside her. She'd taken Charlie's sharpie and painted dots as eyes and lines as smiles on them.

"Hey," Kate said and walked up to them.

"Hi," Ellie said absently, as she now was building a small house for her stones. She was completely engrossed in what she was doing, not paying any attention to anything else, but Kate still whispered when she spoke with Kaylee.

"Dom was drunk last night."

"Not unusual," Kaylee replied bitterly, remembering the night before, and his words.

"Yeah, but with what's been going on with him…" Kate sighed. "What do you know?"

"I don't know anything, really."

"So?"

"So what?"

"You're not gonna go argue with him, try to get the truth?"

"I tried that. And we always just end up fighting so… I'll just leave it be."

"Really?" Kate raised an eyebrow skeptically.

"He'll tell us when he's ready."

Kate looked like she didn't believe her, but Kaylee was being honest. Something scary was going on with Dom, and she wanted to know what it was of course, so that she could help him but… she would wait too.

"What happened to Charlie?"

Kay and Kate turned around to look at Ellie.

"Um," Kate glanced Kay's way, "what do you mean, sweetie?"

"Why is he different?"

Kay walked over to her and took her hand. "What do you say you stay here and play with Kate while I go and check up on Dom?"

Ellie's face shone up.

Kate gave her a look that said, 'Don't you dare leave me.'

Kay just smiled.

.

* * *

.

"Why, aren't you a pretty one?" the marshal had whispered, and Kaylee hadn't been able to help herself, she'd kicked him.

And now her wrists were bruised, the handcuffs tightly tied around them, her lip bloody from where the marshal had hit her and her body aching.

"I mean, the _shock_," the marshal said, chuckling, one finger tapping the steering wheel as he drove through the rain and the dark of the night, "finding out that the siblings of trust issues had picked up someone… and when I found out that the freckled girl was another fugitive. I was absolutely overjoyed."

Kaylee said nothing. Her eyes turned down and face set expressionless, she didn't want to show him her anger. He wasn't worth it.

"So, what'd they do?"

Kaylee almost looked him in the eye at that, but her gaze was turned somewhere above her shoulder. "What?" she gritted out.

"Y'know, Dominic and Katherine Austen don't hang around people unless they use them. So how'd they use you? I figured that they asked for something in particular, been reading your past and it seems as you're very… good."

_Don't look at him. _

"Doesn't say anything about _why_ you killed your stepfather. But, y'know," he grinned gleefully, "your mother dropped some hints, nothing close to proof. But what made you do it? Your step-daddy decided you weren't enough and started on your brother? You made a big heroic sacrifice when cutting the brakes to his car? Think you did something brave?"

The rain tapped at the window, washing away dirt and mud from the road.

"You don't know me," she said instead, and she hated how her voice broke at the last word. The marshal noticed the shiver in her voice, and she could practically see how his ego grew at that.

"But I'm starting to. Still can't figure out why you would join the Austen siblings, though. You – Evans, don't take any offense – but you seem a bit anti-social. Was it because of Dominic?"

Kaylee tensed at that, swallowing.

"You know what they say, girls like boys who are like their fathers –"

"Why?" Kaylee snapped.

"You're gonna have to elaborate that."

Kaylee looked at him now, and she didn't change her expression one bit when she said, "You get some kind of freak on by taunting poor defenseless girls?"

The marshal opened his mouth to respond. Kay turned her gaze to the road.

"Look out!" she screamed, one moment too late. The car hadn't had it lights on, and they hadn't seen it until it was too close. The marshal swerved the car to avoid getting hit. Kaylee cried out when they hit the pole.

She blinked, she'd hit her head on the window, blood trickled down to her nose and eyes and mouth. She coughed of the smoke. She couldn't move. Something – her seat – was pressing into her back and her hands were twisted inside the cuffs.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the unconscious form of Edward Mars.

"Kay!" The door on her side opened, and someone was dragging and pulling her body out of the car. She stumbled and collapsed. Dom's hand was on her arm. He tried to help her stand up, but Kaylee was coughing too much.

When she finally could breathe again, she looked at him. His green eyes were unfocused, his lips parted as he panted, and there was something in the flush of his cheeks that made her realize he was drunk.

"You could've killed me," she said, out of breath. Dom helped her up on her feet, arms wrapped around her. "You could've killed me."

.

* * *

.

"Don't die." It's what many has said to Kim, but Lori didn't think anybody had meant it as much as her. "I really wouldn't be able to stand you as dead. You would be all chirpy and stuff."

Kim didn't answer. Unconscious – sleeping – not aware of all the tears that had been shed for her sake and Lori's words. Andrea said it was a wonder Kim was alive at all, and she guessed Kim must be looking pretty bad, according to what she'd heard at least.

"She drank earlier."

Lori heard the calm tone of John Locke's voice.

"Okay," Lori replied shortly, not really being in the mood to talk to the hunter. Despite the obvious hostility in her voice, Locke kneeled by her side.

"I heard you argue, a few days ago with your brother."

"Eavesdropping, huh?"

"That's another word for it." There was joy in his tone. "I was actually quite surprised when I found out that his Penny was Andrea's sister. Penelope Widmore, the same person that supposedly sent Frederic Phelps and the others to this island."

"Your point?"

She heard Locke stand again. "We're all connected, Lori. Don't forget that. You were meant to find your brother again."

She heard him walk away.

"You hear that, Kimmy?" Lori said. "Least Locke hasn't lost his belief in destiny yet."

* * *

Wendy had stopped talking again.

Margo tried to make her speak, but Wendy would just stare until she went silent.

Zidler didn't know what to do, Charlie wasn't much help. It seemed like his friend didn't care about anything anymore.

Bonnie and Sawyer were gone, walking through the destruction of the jungle, sometimes happy – sometimes sad. And Bonnie would say he was insane, and that he didn't even have a plan. But still she followed him.

Frederic Phelps, shunned by the survivors, found out that Wendy would talk – just not to anyone she knew, when she sat down beside him and asked where he was from.

And the sky was blue, and there was no trace of a cloud that could tell of the horrors that had happened in the storm.

* * *

Dom wasn't by the tree where he'd fallen asleep. Kaylee turned around and was face to face with Ellie again.

Ellie held one of the stones in a tight grip in her hand. She stared at Kaylee, her blue and gray eyes big and scared. Her lower lip trembled like she was going to break down in tears.

Before Kaylee could speak, Ellie opened her mouth, a tear escaping her eye. "Kate's gone."

Kaylee froze. "What?"

Ellie shook her head and looked down; Kaylee snapped back to life and bent down in front of the five-year old, grabbing her arms. The stone dropped to the ground.

"What are you talking about?"

Ellie continued to shake her head, and more tears ran down her face, her body began to shiver with the sobs. "I'm… I'm… sorry. Sorry, Kay."

.

* * *

.

Kaylee wouldn't say much to Dom, and Dom would pretend everything was fine. He would grin, joke and make inappropriate comments about pretty much every girl he saw as usual. And Kate would roll her eyes, sigh and be his little sister like always.

But she knew Kaylee was scared. Kate had also been scared when Kaylee had been taken. Kate had cared about her, but she hadn't known until then just how much. But Kaylee had been scared for another reason entirely. And that fear had turned into fury, and Kate had found herself in one of the many screaming matches that would be held in the future between Kaylee Evans and Dominic Austen.

Dom was gone for the night, away with one of his latest conquests. Kaylee was in the other room, but the walls were thin enough for Kate to hear her sobbing.

Kate knew of Kaylee's past. More messed up than her and Dom's. Because Wayne – he hadn't ever laid a hand on her. It was just her mom.

Kate opened the door, and pretended that she hadn't seen Kaylee crying when she turned on the lights.

"Are you okay?" Kate asked and sat down beside her on the bed, leaning her back against the wall, their shoulders touching. "I guess you didn't get caught much, before… us."

Kaylee groaned and looked up at the ceiling. "Why does he even care? Why would he – it risked both of our lives and how did he even…" She didn't seem to have the words to describe what she was feeling, so she groaned in frustration again.

"What he did was foolish, irrational and absolutely insane. Yeah, he could have gotten himself killed. But I've learned not to argue with Dom about the arguing part. It doesn't change anything. My brother's dangerous. He may sometimes just seem reckless, brave. Other times dorky, childish. But he's dangerous, Kaylee. If he cares about something – he'll do anything to protect it. And I mean anything. But if he's angry at a person he cares about – if he feels betrayed… He loses control."

Kaylee huffed. "I saw a full demonstration of that."

"No, Kay. I'm serious." Kate looked her into the eyes. "Just… remember that, okay?"

.

* * *

.

Kate wasn't at the tent. She wasn't anywhere.

Neither was Dom.

"Where did you see them go?" Kaylee asked Ellie in a shout, and she didn't care that the little girl was crying. All she cared was to get a freaking answer.

Ellie pointed. But it wasn't enough.

Kaylee bent down and grabbed her arms, hard. Ellie struggled a little, and she knew they were catching the attention from people standing near. "Where did they go?"

"There! There!" Ellie yelled, and she was pointing at the jungle, of course.

* * *

Kate was fighting too much. She was quite strong, but she was not trained to hurt, she was trained to run. So she'd tried to – but the rock Charlie slammed over her head was enough to stop her. She collapsed on the ground, sprawled over the tick, green leaves. Her hair blackened with the red blood pouring out from the wound. He dropped the stone beside her.

He turned his head to the side, a curious smirk playing on his lips. But the smirk then turned into horror, as he'd realized fully what he'd done.

There was a moment of confusion. Where he could not tell exactly where he was. Suddenly, he was with Liam, the faceless girls by his side and the stench of perfume so real, the drugs too. But he shook his head, Kate was real. Kate face down in the ground, she was there and he – he'd done that to her.

He didn't know what to do. He fidgeted on the spot, trying to decide whether to leave or to stay but the decision was made for him. He swung around at the sound of leaves rustling.

He blinked when he saw the gun rising to point at his face. He swallowed.

Dom didn't look like he wanted to hear any excuses.

"Step away from her," Dom growled, but he was not watching his sister, but staring at Charlie with one simple word – hatred.

Charlie took a small step. "This is now how it looks," he said quickly. "I… I found her like this."

"Don't lie."

"It was a mistake we – I thought she – I had to protect myself!"

"Oh yeah?"

"Yes! She attacked me and I –"

"I told you not to lie! I do have peripheral vision."

"Step away from her!"

"Okay, okay!" Charlie raised his hands when Dom cocked the gun. "It's okay. I don't I haven't got her now! I – I let her go, all right?"

"For now."

"Why don't you lower the gun? It was just – just a misunderstanding. I won't touch her. I promise! I swear!"

"Swearing ain't good enough."

"You – you can't shoot me."

"I see it in your eye you know, don't want to go all poetic and stuff, but there's somethin' there. I know there will be something there. I can stop it."

"I have no idea what you're talking about!"

"The black smoke."

"You've seen it?"

"Doesn't matter if I've seen it or not. I know what it did to you. I know what it's doing to you. I can't exactly tell you how you're feeling – but I think taking Kate is proof enough that you're slipping over to the dark side, buddy."

"You're drunk!"

"I'll shoot!" Dom roared. Charlie had taken a step forward.

"Then why haven't you fired your bloody gun yet? Oh, it's that darkness deal isn't it? Well I'm tired of your crap! We were arguing and she –"

Dom took a step forward, so abruptly that Charlie shut up.

"I'm sorry."

"Uh, Dom. What are you gonna do? Let's just go back to the camp." Charlie swallowed. "And talk like civilized people about this, yeah? Right."

A leaf fell down between them. And Dom watched in silence. "I've seen things," he admitted.

Charlie seemed almost relieved. "Um, I think we all have done that, mate. No need to point a gun to someone's face though."

"No one of you have seen the things I've seen, believe me. I wish I could stop it – I really do – but, the thing is Charlie, you're gonna have to die."

Charlie was silent, just like Dom. And even though Dom was saying he was not acting. It was like they were both waiting for something, but none of them knew what. Beside them, Kate was still lying unconscious.

"Then shoot me," Charlie said in that stubborn voice he always used when he wanted to prove himself, but there was that something there too, coldness, taunt, he was _daring _him to go through with his threat.

Dom's hand had already been shaking, and now it was shaking even more. A drop of sweat ran down his face, and he was blinking, against the light, maybe trying to blink away the truth.

Charlie slowly turned around, Dom still didn't shoot. A sneer spread on his face.

"You see? Can't do it. You're just a little coward –"

Charlie fell to the ground. Red blood ran down his face from the hole in his skull. He looked too real, dead too soon. His eyes were eternally frozen in shock.

Dom had fired the gun.

Dom threw his gun into the bushes and covered Charlie's body with branches, it was sloppy, but he didn't have much time.

He bent down to Kate's side and gently took her up in his arms. She was heavy. But they had to get out of there.

"STOP!" The voice was absolutely terrified, Dom heard that, but he also heard the sound of a safety released.

He turned around slowly, Kate still in his arms.

"Let her go."

"E tu, Brute?" Dom actually managed to choke out, what with Kaylee standing behind Charlie's body holding the gun he'd used to kill him with.

Kaylee's face was a mix of emotions. Anger, being the strongest of them. But there was also betrayal, fear, confusion but most of all denial, or the will to believe that something that was true wasn't.

"He attacked Kate," Dom said calmly. "I did what I had to to protect her."

"Really, Dom?" Her voice was strained, edging on a sob. "So you weren't talking to him about black smoke monsters and you didn't put a bullet though his head?"

"If I did, I damned as hell had a good reason."

Kate moaned and Dom carefully put her down on the ground again. He looked up at Kaylee. "Put the gun away now."

"No."

"It's not like you're gonna shoot me."

"You don't know that."

"Yes I do."

"You killed him."

Kate's eyes fluttered open. "What's…"

"You were attacked," Dom said to Kate, ignoring the gun and the furious look on Kaylee's face. "Charlie attacked you and he hurt you and I did what I had to do." He turned his attention back to Kaylee. Her hand was shivering hard now. "And if Kay just puts her weapon down, we can go back to the camp and fix you up. Unless, of course." He raised his eyebrows, looking meaningfully at the gun.

Kaylee's hand fell to her side.

* * *

Zidler clutched Margo's hand when the news of Charlie's death reached him. Margo's lower lip trembled and she buried her face in his shoulder.

Wendy, looking around at all the mourning faces, went over to Fred again. Fred hadn't known Charlie.

Kim heard it. But she didn't know it. Fox held her hand a she slipped out and in of consciousness.

Kate fell asleep, after having thrown up from the shock and dizziness.

Andrea tried to rock little Aaron to sleep, almost breaking down in tears of frustration when Libby finally took mercy of her and accepted the burden of the child.

Locke started to dig the grave.

Kaylee swallowed down the tears that threatened to fall, and walked up right behind Dom who was sitting in front of a burning fire, alone.

"Self-defense."

Dom blinked, almost sleepily and turned to look at her. "What?"

"That's what you said it was when I killed Rousseau, even though I didn't believe it. Even though I said I murdered her – you booth stood by me. Both you and Kate. And that…" Kaylee looked into the flames. "You shouldn't be okay with people dying. I'll never be. But this is more than that, isn't it? This is about what you said. This is about what you've seen. And Dom, if I'm ever going to trust you again – be able to be near you without being afraid all the time – you have to tell me the truth."

Dom took a deep breath. "Before the hatch – before the whole implosion and what happened after – I had a dream. It was unlike any other dream I'd had it was – it was a memory. And after the dream, I felt so freaking zen, like – like everything was gonna be okay and I believed in that dream. It – I – I wasn't myself. It was an out-of-body experience. I was even prepared to die. And then… then I think I died, I'm not sure, I'm not sure of anything anymore, Kaylee."

He looked down.

"I saw my life… flash before my eyes. Then I woke up, in the jungle, and I had never ever been more scared in my life. But… but those flashes, those flashes didn't stop. Nope, they continued and it wasn't like the dream. They aren't peaceful, they – they hurt. They frigging break every bone in my body and my head hurts and I feel sick all the time. But that ain't the worst part. The worst part is that in those… flashes. I see things. I see pieces of a puzzle. And those puzzles… It all comes down to one thing.

You… dead."

Kaylee bit her lip, and closed her eyes.

"I'm not so sure. I don't know what they are, those flashes. They could be freaking dreams, they could be reality. It's so damn confusing. I don't know. I don't know when I wake up if what happened yesterday really happened. I don't even know if I'm still dreaming. I think – I think I might be dead.

Kate's in the water and you try to save her. But the waves take you away and in the end both you and Kate drown. The arrow pierces your neck and you choke on your own blood. Two more steps and the lightning strike you."

"That hasn't happened."

"I see smoke – black smoke and Charlie sees it too, and he's kind of freaked out and next thing Charlie's gone, and it's someone else – or, or, he's sick I don't know but he's not the good ol' rock star anymore. There's like this… darkness inside of him. And after a few days he's just moody, but after a couple of weeks… he starts to hurt people – Ellie. But no one listens to her 'cause she's just a kid. Then he hurts Kate. And you – you are mad. So Charlie, he snaps your neck. And that's why I shot him, Kaylee. So he wouldn't kill you both. That's why I'm angry when you go, 'cause I'm not sure if you'll come back. And I might be crazy. But what if I'm not? What if I stop trying to save you and you die? What if both you and Kate die? I wouldn't survive that. Makes me freaking pathetic but I wouldn't. And whatever this is… this course correction… doesn't matter. I'm gonna spend my whole life saving you if that's what it takes. And I don't even care if you can't love me. 'Cause, honestly, who would?"

There was a long silence between them. Kaylee was staring down at the sand and Dom was staring at her.

"Hell, you don't believe me."

"Are you sure… are you sure it's not the alcohol talking? Messing your own life up with some kind of movie?"

"Pretty damn sure."

"Okay." Kaylee said it in a broken voice, and Dom saw a tear fall down her cheek. In a reflex he wiped it away.

"So don't you dare say I don't care, Kaylee. 'Cause I do. Too freaking much."

"I know, I know." She pulled him close, almost an embrace. She sobbed. "I_ know_."

"I love you," he murmured softly, almost too quiet for her to hear.

But she'd heard.

"I know," she whispered as an answer. "I'm sorry."

* * *

Andy said in a low, gentle voice, "I'm just gonna go and check on Kim, you'll be all right?"

Ellie closed her eyes harder at that, and didn't answer. Her little hand clenched into a fist underneath the blanket.

"Okay." She heard Andy go out, not aware that Ellie had just been pretending.

She sat up, looked around to make sure Andy wasn't around; before she took up the stone she'd been playing with before.

"Charlie's gone like dad," she told the stone. "I know that, 'cause everyone says he's gone. They mean the same thing. Gone and dead. So, everyone else who's gone is actually dead. Like daddy."

"I'm not gone."

Ellie turned around, shrieking but a gentle hand was put over her mouth, not forcing her to silence but recommending it.

"It's me, Princess," Allen said warmly, but his voice was hushed, quiet.

Ellie watched her father with big eyes. "Daddy?" she yelled, and she hugged him. She crinkled her nose. "You smell yucky."

"I know, I know." He sounded kind of like he wanted to laugh, Ellie wondered why he didn't. He pulled her away and looked her into the eyes, so she knew he had to have something very important to say.

"Now listen to me, sweetie. We have to be very quiet now. Can you be very quiet?"

Ellie nodded, but frowned. "Why?"

"Because we have to go somewhere far away, and we have to hide. And if we want to stay hidden – we can't be found. So no one, not even Andrea can know where we are, okay?"

"But I don't want to," Ellie whined.

Allen anxiously glanced over his shoulder. "Sometimes we have to do things we don't want to. For the better good."

There were many stars on the sky that night.

The survivors looked after Ellie, believing she'd been lost to the Others. But Ellie thought, that really she hadn't been lost at all.

She had been found.

**

* * *

**

**Author's Notes:** So… this was really emotional even for me, okay? (I'm evil but I do got feelings… somewhere). I warned you about the depressive stuff, right?

Okay, I'll just hide here and wait for you guys to send killer robots after me. Yup.

Late update is late because of visiting schools (stress!) having concerts for the environment (stress!!) being forced to attend to school day after a minimum sleep (EXHAUSTED!!!) The next chapter will be late too, as I have to prepare for going away to Poland… to study English. Yes. I know. It doesn't make sense.

But this is a really long chapter so… yay?

And uh, next chapter will be focusing on what's happening in the Barracks. And answer the question of how in Bentham's name did Allen get there?

Namaste.


	44. Swan Song

_The wild swan's death-hymn took the soul  
__Of that waste place with joy  
__Hidden in sorrow: at first to the ear  
__The warble was low, and full and clear;  
__But anon her awful jubilant voice,  
__With a music strange and manifold,  
__Flow'd forth on a carol free and bold;  
__As when a mighty people rejoice  
__With shawms, and with cymbals, and harps of gold._

- Alfred Tennyson

..

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 36, Swan Song**

.. ..

"Namaste."

The boy turned to look at him. His glasses fell down at the edge of his nose and he pushed them up again.

"You got really big eyes," Vincent Amore said in wonder and pointed.

"Big eyes," his little sister Julia repeated at his side. She made two circles with her hands to show the boy just how big eyes he had.

"Hey!" A girl shouted. She was wearing a white t-shirt, just like Vincent and Julia with the octagon Dharma symbol on. "Be nice."

"We were just welcoming him, Annie. That's what we do here, welcome people." He waved around at the big hall and the adults walking around and the people sitting in the booths giving the new recruit their assignments.

Julia stuck out her tongue. "He's right," she said the best she could with her tongue hanging out her mouth. But then she saw Rosie who was injecting one of the new recruits with vaccine into the arm and she screamed, covering her eyes. "Needles. Bad. Very."

"Don't pay any attention to them," Annie said with a smile to the boy. "They just want the attention. I'm Annie, who're you?"

The boy went paler, and he started to stammer.

"Why can't you speak?" Julia asked completely seriously. "Are you like, a robot?"

"Ben!" a man roared. Julia jumped at his angry voice.

The man, who several people were staring at in shock, grabbed the boy's arm, muttering under his breath. "Let's go. _Work Man_. What a frickin joke."

"He was not very nice," Julie said when they left. "Why was he not very nice?"

She continued to ask that question during the day. But it wasn't until they were sitting in the mess hall, Vincent, and mom and dad and Julia at his side that she got an answer.

"Because," their mother Lisa started patiently, taking a break from humming the latest song she and her music class had been paying over the day, "he was angry."

"But when you're angry you're supposed to think of happy things and get happy! You taught me that!"

"Well, maybe no one taught him that," their father answered. He was called Vincent too, and Vincent was proud to share the name as his dad. His dad was in security, which was way cooler than most of the kids' parents' jobs.

"Is he a Hostile?" Julia asked.

His parents exchanged worried looks. "Why would you think that, sweetie?" his mother asked.

"'Cause…" Julia looked down, "aren't Hostiles angry too? Why would they otherwise be mean?"

"You don't worry about the Hostiles, sweetheart. I and Vince will protect you all. Since he's gonna be in Security just like me, right?"

Vincent nodded and grinned. "Right."

.. ..

Juliet heard someone knock on the door. She peered out the window, but the rain was falling too hard and she couldn't see through the drops on the glass.

"Who is it?" she shouted, taking a glance at herself on the mirror at her side. There were dark shadows under her eyes and her hair was in a mess.

"Vince!"

She opened the door, and the wind hit her hard in the face. Vincent Amore was standing outside, holding a bag. His black hair was hanging in front of his eyes; he was completely drenched by the rain.

"Oh, come in. Don't stand out there." She opened the door fully. The clouds were dark on the sky.

Vincent shook his head. His usual warm brown eyes had something dark in them. "No, Juliet. We need to talk, but not here."

"There is nothing wrong with my house," Juliet replied simply, her expression smoothing out to become calm. But she still took the yellow umbrella and followed him out in the rain.

Vincent's house was much bigger than hers. But that was mostly because there were always children there. In the hall's wall there were stick figures made by a clumsy three-year old's hand. There were shoes in all colors and sizes. And propped up with a large book in the living room a teenager sat.

"So," Juliet said coolly, turning to Vincent. "What was it you wanted to discuss?"

The girl in the chair turned a page, but Juliet could see out of the corner of her eye that the girl was watching them intently with her hazel eyes.

"The kitchen," Vincent said simply, glancing at the girl who now was completely engrossed in the book again.

As soon as the door was closed behind them Vincent opened his bag. He dropped the tape on the table. Juliet raised an eyebrow but said nothing more.

"All right, Juliet. I've known you for three years, so I'm not gonna start yelling at ya –" Vincent frowned like he was considering it, "– but well I might, 'cause I've known you for _three bloody years_, and this... there gotta be a reason for this. What the hell are you doing?"

Juliet looked down at the tape. "You've lost me."

"This –" Vincent waved a hand "– mystic tape, contains footage of your house, your kitchen. And I would really like for you to explain to me why you're working with Maddy and Claire."

Juliet stared at the tape, and said in a low tone, "Have you told Ben?"

"No," Vincent sighed. "I haven't, though, can't say for sure that Garrett and Kiyoshi might have. They could've seen this too, wasn't exactly hidden away in a safe box."

"Vince," Juliet smiled, but it didn't quite reach to her eyes, "as you've said – I've been your friend for three years. Of course I'm not working with them. I'm working with Ben. It's all a part of the plan. Don't worry. This tape – means nothing. This is a test. Ben has grown tired of Maddy's… escapades for a long time. But as we both know, he has never been able to do anything since she's under Elizabeth and Garrett's protection. But now… he has gotten the evidence so we can finally let her go off this island."

"Really, Jules?"

Juliet shrugged. "Really, Vince."

"So, if I were to call, say, Ben right now. That'd be what he would say?"

Juliet blinked, turning her brilliant blue eyes to look at him slowly. "Of course."

"All right then. If this turns out to be the truth – please God let it be the truth, we got enough doubters here, then I'm very deeply sorry, yeah?"

Juliet chuckled lightly. "Yeah."

They walked out of the kitchen together. The tension seemingly gone for anyone watching, but it was there, in the cold eyes of Juliet and in the slight stiffness in Vincent's shoulders.

"I'm going out for just a quick stroll to the station," Vincent said as he put on his boots. "I'll be right back. You'll be okay, right, Eva?"

Eva looked up from the book and she put it down. Her face was completely expressionless. It was hard to tell if she'd heard their conversation or not. She just nodded, before she stood up and walked down the opposite hallway down to her room.

The door slammed close behind her.

Vincent turned to look at Juliet. "That's her way of saying it's not."

.. ..

"So what are you gonna be?" Vincent asked, after just having explained his big plans on becoming the Sherriff in Security to Ben.

"What?" He looked a little bit lost, like he hadn't been listening at all to what Vincent had said.

Vincent pouted. "What're you gonna be?"

"I…" Ben pulled the sleeves on his jumper down over his hands. "I don't know."

"Why're you wearing that?" Vincent climbed down the tree to sit down beside Ben on the ground. Ben didn't like to climb trees. Vincent couldn't understand why, there were so many!

"What?"

"It's really warm. Mom says it's unhealthy, you could like… drop dead from heat."

Ben blushed. "It's not that warm."

Vincent shrugged. "You're weird."

"Hey!"

Vincent groaned when he heard his little sister's voice from behind him. Julia grinned at them, she was holding a doll in her left hand and she was twisting her black hair with the other.

"Can I play too? Mom got lessons. It's boring. I hate the piano."

"No," Vincent muttered. Ben shifted uncomfortably beside him.

"But please. I'm bored. Please_, please, pleeeaaase_!"

"You're too small!"

Julia pouted. "I'm not!"

"She can if she wants too," Ben whispered uncertainly, but Vincent elbowed him. Ben winced as if it hurt, strange.

"You can't even go into the jungle by yourself!"

"Yes I can!"

"No you can't! You're too much of a wuss."

"I'm not!"

"Prove it."

Julia glowered at him, before she with sure steps stalked off towards the jungle.

"Isn't she forbidden to go there?" Ben whispered.

Vincent turned around to look at the yellow houses in the distance, away from his baby sister. "She won't go in there. She's too scared."

Vincent was sitting in the living room, later in the evening, while his mother was running around the house, picking up papers and looking under tables.

"Vince, have you seen my notes?" she asked, twisting her hands in stress. "I can't find my notes!"

"Which ones are you lookin' for?"

"The new ones!" His mother fretted. "Julia!" she shouted, disappearing out of his view. "Julia! Have you seen them? Julia? Where are you?"

She came back into the living room again. "Vincent, have you seen your sister?"

Vincent shook his head.

"Come on now. Gotta drop you and Julia off at – JULIA!" His mother shouted again.

"She's probably outside," Vincent told her.

"Of course she is." His mom sighed. "Can you go fetch her?"

Vincent hurried outside. He glanced over his shoulder to see if his mom was following him.

She wasn't.

Vincent was panting when he arrived at Ben's porch. He managed to get out a breathless 'hey' when the boy opened the door.

"Uh, Vince, um, what is it?" Ben asked carefully.

"Julia's gone."

.. ..

When Vincent came down to the security station, he was met by a very tired-looking Garrett.

"Hey, Gary," Vince said, sitting down in one of the chairs. "Has the island ever succumbed to a tsunami? Because the storm outside – it ain't lookin' pretty for the moment."

Garrett, usually very pleasant to speak to, muttered something for an answer.

"Didn't get much sleep, huh?" Vincent continued.

"I there something you wish, Vincent?" Garrett asked tiredly, without looking at him.

"Actually, I was here to take your shift. Figured you needed it."

"Needed it why?" Garrett asked, continuing to go through the documents on the desk.

"Because of Maddy."

Garrett ever so slightly flinched. "What about Madeline?"

"Hate to be the one to break this to you, and I'm not the biggest gossip here around, but everyone knows that the final drop finally happened. I've been around lot of kids to know, that they all go through this rebellious phase, and it's just that Maddy's happenin' a little bit later that most – and with Liz gone… but that's understandable. So, don't beat yourself up over it."

"Understandable?" Garrett asked, his eyes never leaving the papers.

Vincent walked over to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Get some sleep, I mean it."

Garrett sighed. "Fine." He stood up, and looked apologetic for a moment, but then he left without another word.

Vincent immediately walked over to the comm. "Lalah, dear, you there?"

"_No…_" All that came in was static after the first word.

"Hello? Hello?" The storm had to be really getting worse by the second. "I need to speak with Ben!"

"_B-Ben_ –" _static_ "– i_nfection_ –" more static. "_The surgery didn't go as pl… ned. We're returning after… as soon… storm calms down_. _Wait_."

Vincent waited.

.. ..

"She must be here somewhere," Vincent said as they walked through the jungle.

"Shouldn't we call for her?" asked Ben, stumbling over a stone on the ground.

"And alert the others that I, her big brother, lost her? No way." Vincent pulled away a branch, carefully so it wouldn't hit Ben. "Dad would be like, really angry."

"Maybe she went…" Ben stopped walking and shit his mouth.

"What?" Vincent stopped too and looked at him, Ben looked scared.

"Well, uh, I don't know, but, maybe she went…"

"What, Ben? Where do ya think she went?"

"The sonar fence," Ben blurted out. "What if she went there?"

Between the trees, in the distance Vincent could make up the fence. He shook his head. "She knows we're not allowed."

Ben shrugged. "Okay."

After ten awkward seconds they both started sprinting towards the fence.

"Wait!" Ben shouted when Vincent was about to run between the two pylons. "We need to shut it off first."

"You know the code?"

Ben bent down by a control. "Yeah."

The fence was deactivated.

"Come on! Hurry!" Vincent waved at Ben, who stared at him with big eyes. Yeah, it probably hadn't been the smartest idea to run over to the other side without trying with an animal or something if it worked, but they didn't really had the time. There were lots of things that could've happened to Julia. There were dangerous animals, and she could fall down a ravine, or down on some rocks! Or even drown!

And that was excluding all the horrible things the Hostiles could do. Vincent wasn't a hundred percent sure what the Hostiles could do, but he knew it was bad.

"Over here!" Ben said and ran over to the creek.

_Oh, no. She had drowned. _But there was no one by the creek, he frowned. "Do you know where we are going?"

Ben shook his head, but Vincent could see he was blushing.

"You've been out here before?"

Ben said sternly, "We should keep looking."

"If you know somethin' –"

"I don't!"

Vincent nodded, but he watched Ben suspiciously when they walked by the creek. It was sort of pretty out here, Vincent thought. It didn't seem any dodgy at all.

_BANG!_

Vincent whirled around. "What was that?"

Ben grasped at his arm, looking around at the forest too.

He ducked when there was another loud noise heard.

"It's gunfire!" Vincent exclaimed. Ben was nodding frantically at his side.

"Julia!" Vincent suddenly remembered, and he set off towards the sounds of the shooting.

"Vince!" Ben shouted, but didn't follow him when he darted through the jungle.

He saw them from far away. He recognized the Dharma jumpsuits and the faces of people he'd been living with for many years. And there were other faces too, but he couldn't see clearly who because of the branches and the plants – but he knew they were Hostiles.

"VINCENT!" someone screamed.

Vincent froze. But the scream hadn't been directed at him.

He saw his father fall to the ground.

.. ..

"There's a leak in my roof."

Nastasia Lebedev, without getting an invitation, stepped inside the house. Behind her two kids trailed after, holding hands.

"Hey Zack, Emma." Vincent greeted the children with a smile. The boy smiled back but the older girl looked mostly just annoyed, throwing furious glances Nastasia's way. He turned back to the blonde woman. "You want me to fix it, eh?"

She shook her head. When she spoke it was only with a slight Russian accent, "That won't be necessary. I can do it myself. I was simply wondering if you could watch the children while I'm doing it. It might take the whole night."

"Yeah, of course." Vincent smiled brightly.

Nastasia nodded shortly. "Behave well now," she told the two siblings. "Thank you very much, Vincent."

She left through the raging rain, and he closed the door behind her.

"What do you want to do?" Vincent asked, after Zack and Emma were somewhat dry and had seated themselves in the living room. Emma shrugged, and absently picked on the sleeve of her pink cardigan. Zack, despite his sister's moody behavior, shot up enthusiastically.

"I want to bake!" he declared. Emma rolled her eyes. She dragged her feet behind her when they went into the kitchen, looking down.

Inside the kitchen, a teenage girl was sitting. Her long light brown hair hung freely in curls around her shoulders. She was holding a book in her hands, and when she turned a page a faint scar on her arm was shown. When she heard them come in, she looked up. Her hazel eyes were curious and intense as she watched them.

"Hi, Eva," Zack chirped. "What're you reading?"

Eva held up the book, _Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret. _She turned her gaze back to the book again.

"Do you want to join us, Eva?" Vincent asked, as he took out a bowl. "We're baking, uh…" He looked at Zack.

"Muffins!"

"We used to do those chocolate ones with our mom," Emma told them bitterly. Vincent gave her a warning glance.

Eva stared at them, but she finally stood up. She was taller than both of the kids.

She nodded.

Vincent smiled brightly, but acted like it was nothing special, no phenomenon. Emma quickly caught on, and stopped staring to take out the recipe. Zack, didn't know that they were supposed to act like it was no big deal, but he still was, too little to understand.

When Zack was lying on the sofa and Emma on the spare bed, asleep to the thunder outside. Vincent said goodbye to Eva who had not yet gone to sleep (she didn't say goodbye back), and left for Juliet's house.

She opened the door quickly, ushering him inside, worried eyes looking at the rain.

But he shook his head. "Ben's returning tomorrow – as soon as the storm's gone calmer. I believe you, Jules. But we need to discuss this, all three of us."

Juliet nodded, smiling a bit shyly before he walked away. She closed the door and turned around.

"You heard?"

Maddy nodded. "I heard."

.. ..

"A stupid medal isn't gonna bring dad back!" Vincent had screamed at Horace's shocked face before storming off into the forest.

He'd climbed up the biggest and tallest tree he could find, and he was half-hidden behind the thick branches and the green leaves. He leaned back against it, and let the tears fall.

He sat there for a long time, sobbing until there were no more tears left and he just stayed there in a daze. The light turned darker and darker and he had a hard time seeing the ground.

That was when someone found him.

"Vincent?" he heard Ben say.

"Yeah." It was all he could say for the moment.

"Are you… can you come down?"

"No."

"Everyone's worried about you, especially Julia. Annie's with her."

"Where's mom?"

"Um, I don't know."

Vincent suddenly realized that Ben was actually climbing up the tree, although with great difficulty.

Vincent rolled his eyes. "Stop! Stop. I'm comin' down."

He jumped gracefully back on the ground below the tree, and sat down on one of the low, large branches next to Ben.

"Everyone's looking for you too."

"No they're not."

"Well,_ I_ was. You should come back."

"Why?"

"Because."

"That's the stupidest reason ever." Vincent sighed deeply. "You don't understand."

"My mom's dead."

"She wasn't killed."

"Yes she was. And it was my fault. Just like your dad's death is yours."

Vincent stared at Ben. Then he suddenly tackled him to the ground. All air left Ben's lungs and he had to fight to breathe when Vincent punched him hard in the face.

There was blood on his fingers.

Suddenly realizing what he'd done he pulled back. "Sorry. Sorry, Ben. Sorry."

Ben pulled himself up on his elbows. "It's okay. You're angry."

Vincent shook his head. "No it's not. Dad's dead – and yeah, it – it's my fault. The fence wouldn't have been down if it weren't for me. He wouldn't have been out there, looking for me either."

"You see?" And Ben's eyes were huge when he stood up again, a bit wobbly on his feet. "It's not the Hostiles. They didn't do anything wrong! We were on their ground. They protected themselves. They're not bad, really."

"I don't want to stay here, with Dharma, anymore."

Ben was silent for a long time before he said, "Just be patient."

.. ..

It was raining too much.

He strained his eyes to see, but there was nothing to look at.

Then something flickered – a light – one of the lampposts were lit.

And Allen wanted to smile, but he couldn't. Not yet.

..

Kiyoshi Midorikawa was looking forward to get away from the Barracks. He didn't like the looks Juliet kept throwing him, and he didn't like the pain in his head and the fact that his memories from Claire's escape attempt was a… chaotic mess. He missed the sea. The smell of the ocean. The peace.

And he was just one step from regaining it all again, throwing his bag into the back of the truck when a chirpy voice said, "Where are you leaving to?"

He turned around. His eyes widened just slightly when he saw it was Madeline. He was not used to hear Maddy... _chirp, _unless she was singing, which she never even did with a smile like now.

A flicker of a memory, but he pushed it away, he didn't need to dwell on it. It was that mother, Claire, who'd knocked him out. Not Maddy.

But there was something about her.

"To the coast," Kiyoshi replied warily, quite stoic in the way he met her eyes, "further down east."

Maddy looked around, smiling again. "We are in a storm."

And yet, she was out there with him, the rain was not falling down as hard as before, but it still wasn't good weather.

"No." It felt unnerving about answering so many unnecessary questions. "The water won't hurt me. I have been on this island since I was seventeen. I know."

He expected that to be the end of the conversation, and opened the door to step inside. When Maddy was suddenly beside him again, pulling back her hair and looking strangely innocent.

"May I come with you?"

"I think that would be unwise, your father wouldn't exactly be too pleased about that."

Maddy put a hand on his arm. "_Please_."

"Go back."

Maddy looked slightly desperate. "Well you should not leave on your own. No matter how much you know the island. The rain is still rain. The storm is still dangerous."

Kiyoshi decided he didn't have time for this, he didn't know the girl very much. But he knew she always caused trouble. He stepped inside the truck.

"Get out," Maddy spat.

Kiyoshi looked her right into the eye, and shook his head.

Someone came out through the rain, running up beside Maddy.

"You should listen to the girl," Allen said, pointing the gun at Kiyoshi's head. "Get out now."

Maddy knocked Kiyoshi out for the second time and dragged him into the bushes.

Claire threw a worried look his way.

"He's going to be fine. He was speaking the truth – the island won't harm him."

Claire swallowed. "Okay." She looked up at the trees. "What about the cameras?"

Maddy looked up also. "The storm has destroyed almost all of them. And the ones still working don't matter. You both will be far away from here by then."

"Us both?"

Maddy held out a gun. Claire stared at it but didn't take it.

"You will need it," Maddy told her.

Claire sounded broken when she said, "I – I can't…"

Maddy took her hand and wrapped her fingers around the weapon. "I am staying so I can save your friends. I'm staying so you can save your son. You know what you have to do once you find him, do you not?"

Claire nodded. "But you keep the gun." She pushed it away into Maddy's hands again.

"Come on!" Allen shouted and Claire ran over to him, they both stepped inside the truck. Maddy smiled weakly when she saw the door close.

A shot rang out.

She hunched down to the ground immediately, another bullet whizzing by her, someone screaming.

"DON'T SHOOT MADDY!"

She released the safety and fired blindly, close enough to scare but not enough to hit.

"GO!" she screamed and the truck started. Another bullet ran straight into the window, glass shattering.

She jumped into the back of the truck, small pieces of glass under her palms, ducking her head as they continued shooting. The truck drove fast over the muddy road.

She crawled up on all fours. "They are following us!" she screamed.

The truck lurched and she was thrown to the side. She cried out in pain, holding her shoulder. The gun was dropped on the road behind them.

The sky thundered above them.

"STOP!" Maddy screamed. "STOP!"

The truck stopped. Allen ran outside and helped Maddy down on the ground.

Claire came out also, her short hair in a mess and she was soaked from the rain just like Allen. But they were both fine.

"I need to shut it off," Maddy told them, looking over her shoulder and then at the pylons.

"What are they?" Allen asked and they followed her, over to the place were two pylons centered the road.

Maddy bent down by the left one, pulling away the grass to reach the control. "What you need to know about them is that if you go between them you're dead. And that they keep out… well, Jim likes to call it the monster." She pushed in 2-3-8-2.

The fence buzzed and then shut down.

"Is it safe now?" Allen asked.

"Yes, it's sa –" Maddy stumbled forward and down on her knees. Claire grabbed at her shoulders but she fell down, red blood spreading over the back of her shirt. She could do nothing but gasp, lying there on the ground, too much in shock to move. The trees were green, blue, and it was all too blurry for her to see more colors. The sounds faded away until she could hear nothing.

Then someone – Allen took her up in his arms.

"Claire," Maddy gasped after breath, clinging onto him. He started to run. "No, no, where is Claire?"

..

Claire pressed her back up against the car door, her hands raised. Allen and Maddy were gone, but she saw some of the Others run into the jungle beyond the fence after them. The rain was pounding down, and instead of hiding her, it made her feel so much smaller than before.

"Raise your hands!" someone yelled and she did. She held them up, trying to breathe slower, trying not to panic. She had been so close.

She wondered what they would do to her now, now that they had caught her. Now that she had tried to escape again. They didn't have any use for her, did they? So why keep her around.

One of them punched her. Hard. And her head slammed into the car. She whimpered. Her legs gave out under her.

"Get away from her!" someone shouted over the rain, and the man with the rifle backed away.

Messy blonde hair, hanging over blue eyes, Juliet bent down, grabbing her arm hard and raising Claire back to her feet.

"Why did you do it?" Juliet roared. Claire stared at her in shock. Juliet shook her, grabbing both of her shoulders. "Do you have _any_ idea what you've done?"

"J-Juliet…"

Juliet turned her head to the Others around her. "Follow them. Don't let him get away!"

"But –" one of them started, looking worriedly at the jungle around them, at the storm raging.

"GO!"

All of them swung their guns and rifles, but none of them moved. Claire squinted through the rain, trying to see what they were aiming at.

The sky lit up.

"Howdy!" Owen Chauncey yelled. On her side was a girl, black hair, bony built, and hunched shoulders. Owen held one hand in a hard grip on the shoulder. In the other hand she held a gun, pressed against the side of the girl's head. "Long time no see!"

..

"Take her away," Juliet told Sarah.

Sarah stayed on the spot, looking from Owen to Claire.

"And radio Garrett."

Sarah nodded and grabbed Claire's arm, pointing a gun at her.

"No – no!" Claire protested, trying to wriggle herself free. "OWEN! Owen!"

"STOP!" Owen screamed, releasing the safety off her gun. Sarah stopped in her tracks.

"Why don't you lower your gun, Owen?" Juliet shouted – trying to sound calm.

Owen shook her head. "Nu-uh. I got Alex at gunpoint, guys. And I bet she's important to you if you haven't shot me yet. And I will shoot her if you piss me off. 'Cause you cannot believe how the journey here has been. Just – just look at my hair. I'm not well-balanced when my hair is like this, all right?"

Alex gave her a look that clearly said 'You're crazy, bloody crazy'. But Owen didn't bother about that – Alex had thrown her worse looks, it was Owen, who had pointed a gun at her in the first place after all.

It had been quite a coincidence, when Owen stumbled up on Alex on her way to the Others.

Coincidence.

Fate.

Destiny.

All the same, really.

"All right," Juliet took a step forward. "What is it that you want?"

"I want to talk with Ben."

"That's not possible."

"Sure it is, you open your mouth and make sounds, totally easy."

Alex crossed her arms. Owen pressed the gun harder into her skull.

"You cannot talk to Ben because Ben is not here."

Owen looked down and sighed. "Well… then I guess." She turned to Alex. "Bye, bye."

"STOP!" Juliet shouted. "He'll be arriving here soon. But it's too dangerous now through the storm."

"Okay, Blondie. You have no idea what it's like out there in the storm. But okay, I won't shoot her. Let me talk to that man with the deliciously long eyelashes instead."

"What?"

"That guy with the half unbuttoned blue shirt…"

"What?"

"Richard! Yikes." Owen rolled her eyes.

"He's not here either."

"Okay." Owen bit her lip. "That's it. Say goodbye to little miss Other-teen Alex."

"All right." Juliet turned to the Others on her side. "Take Claire away. And shoot her."

"You're not going to shoot me!" Owen exclaimed scandalized as Claire was dragged away, throwing pleading looks Owen's way. But Owen wasn't looking at her.

"Why not?" And there was that icy tone that fit perfectly with her cold eyes.

"'Cause –" Owen released her grip on Alex's shoulder and waved with her hand, "– I'm special and all remember?"

"What about your hand?" Juliet took another step closer. "I guess you won't be able to play the guitar anymore. But you will live."

Owen looked at her hands. She was quite fond of them.

"Juliet," of the Others hissed, "we sho –"

The sky – the world – thundered. The rain seemed to stop for one involuntarily second, just as the world froze, when there was a large crack and the tree fell.

Owen's hands reached for Alex – she couldn't lose concentration – when the gun was snatched away from her hands in one quick move. She whirled around and fell backwards with one well-aimed punch.

She moaned and touched her now bloody lips, she looked up at the man who'd come out of nowhere.

The last thing she remembered before she blacked out was the tattoo of two king chess pieces – one of them white – one of them black.

..

She saw something silvery shimmer. _Black._ She blinked, opening her eyes again, away from the darkness surrounding every corner, and looked pale wood - a table. She groaned, and turned her head that rested against it. She raised her head slightly. Her cheek stung, her arms burned. There was a silver handcuff on her left hand, which tied her with the chair she sat on.

"_Man,_" she groaned and lifted her head up completely. Someone came over to her side, judging by the wet blonde hair that she could see out of the corner of her probably very bruised eye (according to the pain) it was Juliet, "I'm having the most disturbing flashbacks. I think you used to feed me drugs." She looked up and tried to look as innocently as possible.

"Juliet, leave." She heard a gruff voice say.

"But Garrett–"

"She will never be serious if you are here."

Juliet huffed and stomped off, by the way the door slammed Owen guessed she was in Juliet's… house.

"Is there shampoo here?" Owen asked, actually quite cheerfully as the gruff voice guy walked past her and sat down at the opposite end of the table. He had very messy shaggy brown hair and a very pathetic stubble, like he'd just woken up. He didn't look quite so intimidating. "Or chicken? I have this sudden craving for it. Would you please get me chicken – Garrett, is it?"

He stood up and walked over to the fridge. Owen turned her head, which hurt, and saw him take out a plate with what looked like leftovers.

He put it down in front of her before sitting down again, his hands together.

Owen frowned and looked down at the chicken. "No knife and fork?" When she looked up the man was staring at her with an expressionless face. "I'll just eat with my hands then."

Garrett tilted his head to the side. "You should treat me with respect."

His eyes went a little darker, but he still didn't look dangerous or ice-cold like Juliet could be. "Uh, remind me why?"

"Because we are the ones with the weapons. Because we are the ones who have your friends. And because if you don't listen to us…" He left the sentence in the air, but she thought she got what he meant.

Owen leaned forward. "You'll kill me? Well, you didn't do _that _the last time. And I'm still here, aren't I?" She leaned back, swinging as much she dared on the chair

Garrett sighed. "Why do you wish to speak with Ben?"

"I will speak to Ben about that."

"Why do you make this so hard?" He tilted his head again, looking just a bit confused by her ways.

"Because nothing's easy."

"I am going to be patient and ask you again – what do you want with Ben?"

Owen leaned forward again, and her eyes glared into his. "When he arrives, I'll talk to him about that."

..

Alex looked at the picture of herself on the wall by the door. It was a horrid picture; she thought she looked awful on it. But Ben had insisted that it would hang there, and if Ben wanted something – Alex didn't have much say.

She had been so close to finally leave. She had helped Lorraine Hume, and this was the reward.

At least Karl was okay somewhere.

..

The wind was blowing less, and now it was simply an easy rain compared to the storm that had raged.

First off the boat was Ben, with the help of Felicity Hale, that was a given as she was a doctor – but it was strange to the unknowing watcher that Jack Shephard was on the other side. There was a slight hint of dislike on Jack's face, but it was of course just small.

Ben's face showed clearly his distaste for sitting in the wheelchair, but he didn't protest. He was resigned to it.

Felicity leaved his side quickly to help someone else off the boat.

"Oh right, because a shoulder under my arm can make up for the fact that I can't walk." Jim's faint attempts to shove Felicity off were useless, and she still had her arm around her when they were out on the dock.

Out from the trees, hurrying in a fast pace toward the arrivers, came Garrett and Vincent. Ben, with just some slight difficulty turned the wheelchair around without Jack's help.

As soon as they were closed enough to speak Vincent said aimed at Jack, "What's he doin' all free like a bird?"

Garrett shot him a look that clearly said 'this was not what we were supposed to say.'

"We need to talk."

Ben nodded slowly. "Of course."

Jack raised his eyebrows, said nothing but went over to where Felicity was trying to make Jim take the crutches. ("I don't need them!" "You just said you couldn't walk." "What are you? A lawyer?")

Behind them Claret stepped down from the boat. She looked with curiosity at the island, a bit of sadness when she looked down.

"Where is Richard?" Garrett asked.

"He stayed behind for now."

Garrett opened his mouth to say something more, but Vincent interrupted him.

"Yeah, lovely." He shut him up. "And before you ask if he's all right from the surgery Gary, look and see he's breathing. There's a lot of catching up to do, but we can do that later. Ben, Owen Chauncey's at Julie's house and she wants to speak with ya."

.. ..

"Happy birthday!" Vincent said happily.

Ben blinked in surprise. It was the same year after year. And Vincent couldn't blame him, no one else than Vincent himself ever remembered it.

"Um, thank you." Ben looked down, he seemed a bit nervous.

"Are you all right? Your old man isn't givin' you too much trouble?"

"Actually I'm on my way to deliver some food to the Pearl with him right now." Ben stepped out of his house and closed the door behind him.

"All right, then." Vincent smiled. "Let's get together for a few beers later. I gotta get to work now but –"

"Wait," Ben walked up to him. He looked around, seemingly to check if someone was listening to them. "Do you remember, just after your father died, when I told you that you had to be patient?"

"Yeah…"

Ben nodded and left.

Vincent sighed; Ben was getting weirder and weirder by each year. His sister didn't think he should spend time with someone like that, but his sister had apparently forgotten that Vincent was an adult now and that Ben was an outcast, and really, Vincent was the only friend he had.

He arrived outside the classroom, stressed, the words Ben had said earlier forgotten.

"You're late," Wilhelmina told him.

"No," Vincent said, opening the door. "You're early."

Some things seem to happen really quickly.

The window's glass shattered. Someone barged into the room. And he couldn't even scream before there was only darkness.

.. ..

"Stop doing that."

"Do what?"

"The singing."

"I have a very beautiful voice…" Owen's voice trailed off when she heard the door open. She leaned forward and tried to see who'd entered as Juliet made her way around the table. She heard low voices speaking, hushed, and rapid.

She whistled loudly. "I can hear you, you know," she lied. But there was something about the way how they all silenced, all at once, that didn't give her any satisfaction but only a ting of fear.

Juliet, Garret, none of the Others came into the kitchen. She heard the door open, people leave, the faint voice of Juliet's before it closed.

And then Ben rolled into the room in a wheelchair.

All fear she might have had disappeared when she saw the cripple he'd become. His eyes were big, something cruel and unspoken in them just like the last time she'd seen them. But here was the thing: Owen could walk. Apparently, he could not.

"Whoa," she said when he watched her, "what happened to you?"

Ben shook his head, like he couldn't quite believe that she actually _dared_. "Why are you here, Owen? You didn't exactly arrive at the best time."

"Believe me." Owen really wanted to run her fingers through her hair to emphasize that, but they were pretty tied up for the moment. "I know. Try getting through a bloody storm with this ninja chick who takes every opportunity to run off and steal your gun while you actually have no freaking clue where you're going. But I guess you've been through something bad too, last time I saw you, you could walk."

There was something similar to an almost smile on Ben's face. "What do you want, Owen?"

"No small talk?"

"Not after what you've done."

Silence.

"How is he?"

Ben knew exactly who she was talking about.

"Angry."

Owen shrugged. "Figures. I messed him up pretty bad, didn't I? Well, what's done is done."

"You really feel no guilt? Why?"

Owen blinked and took a deep breath. "You asked me why I'm here. And I'm here because I want something from you. But – I'm not expecting to get it for free. I'll pay."

"So, what is it?"

"I want you to let Lalita go. I'm not asking for anything other than that. Let her go, don't follow her, never take her again and don't hurt her."

"We're not gonna do that."

"Yes you are. Because as payment I'll join you. I'll go with you willingly – my own choice. And we will all live happily ever after."

..

Owen looked nothing like herself. She hadn't even gotten a change of clothes; they were still clinging onto her body, dirty and soaked with the rain. Her hair was hanging in tests and her face was bruised just like her wrists that were red. She had just caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. And she looked… not broken… _weak. _

The lights were out, and the two guards on her sides shielded her. The cells continued on, empty, except for the last one.

Lalita heard the steps and she looked up. But it wasn't until the cell door opened that the saw.

She saw Owen, looking torn and beaten up, nothing like her usual self. So what she didn't expect was for Owen to stay outside, while the guards entered.

"What's going on?" Of course she sounded confused, who wouldn't be?

The guards took her out, but one of Lalita's hands reached out and got a hold of Owen's arm.

"They're letting you go." Owen shrugged off her hand, went into the cell willingly, didn't protest as the door slammed closed and the lock clicked into place.

Lalita stared wide-eyed at her. She shook her head. "No."

"Yes. They're letting you go, and you will go."

"No!"

"There's nothing for you to stay for."

"I will not leave without my daughter!"

"She's buried somewhere in the cemetery if you want to take her ashes."

Lalita went silent. The guards didn't push her. She needed to stay and hear.

Owen swallowed and looked down. "Go. Don't look back. 'Cause there's nothing to look back at. They're _both_ gone now. And forever. Goodbye Lalita. See you around."

They dragged her away, against her screams, against her will.

Owen sat down in her new prison.

..

When the sonar fence was up again, and Lalita was on the side facing the jungle, away from them – she whirled around.

"When I see one of you again – I will kill you. I promise."

And she disappeared into the trees, into the green and the blue rain.

Garrett had been around long enough to know she was speaking the truth.

..

Brian and Boone weren't in their cells. One of them was almost nothing. And one of them was everything when he sat down on the chair next to Claire's and tucked a strand of her blonde hair behind her ear.

"How did you live?" Claire asked, and she bit on her lip afterwards, on the already red mark there from having done so, so many times before.

"They say it's because of the balance," Boone told her with a sigh, and he looked away, looked at the pale blue windowless wall. "Brian says it's because he saved me."

"What do you say?"

Boone shrugged. "I say it's luck."

Claire stared at him, and it looked almost like she was about to cry. She blinked hard. "What are they going to do to us?"

"They'll punish us. See, they can't really kill us, for some mad reason. But they can't let us go either. And they can't let us join them. So they punish us, because that's the only thing they can do."

"I'm sorry," Claire sobbed, and she put her hand over his. He looked at her in surprise. But she didn't see it. "I'm sorry."

"It – it's not your fault… Claire…"

She sobbed again, tears falling down her face and she took away her hand to bury her face in them. Boone just watched her silently.

They were left in the lonely room for the whole night. In the morning, when Claire had fallen asleep, her head on Boone's shoulder, Richard opened the door.

Boone threw him one glance, nodded, before he gently stood up, laying Claire so she was sleeping over both of the chairs, and walked out of the room.

The door closed behind him.

Claire didn't wake up.

Not until the door opened again and Brian was thrown inside, eyes bruised and swollen so much that he could barely see, lips bloody and split, skin raw to touch.

Broken.

..

Maddy was bleeding too much.

Allen didn't really know what to do.

She kept asking after her father.

Allen could only give her some water from the stream. She was slowing him down. He knew what he had to do. He had to choose.

He left her with fruit, close there by the water, and a promise, that if she was still there when he came back, he would take care of her.

Then he left.

At sundown, Maddy caught up with him. Furious that he actually believed she had been dying. And that she would go with him and help his daughter no matter what – because she couldn't protect Claire.

..

"Niles!" Lalah shouted, but of course the man didn't stop, but continued to walk over the green grass.

Lalah considered pulling out her gun, but that would be too much. There were people around them, though far away, picking up debris and trying to repair what'd been broken in the storm.

She caught up to him, put a hand on his shoulder and turned him around. He took a step back, but stayed. His green eyes looked dark, and the hand that didn't hold the notepad was closed in a fist.

"Yeah, hello to you too," Lalah muttered. "Since you're never the one for small talk – do you have a message for me?"

Niles looked at her for a long moment. Then he shook his head. He made a move to walk away but Lalah took one more step forward, forcing him to stay.

"Are you sure?"

Niles looked a little bit hesitant, then he took out a pen from his shirt pocket and started to write. He turned the notepad around to she could see.

"No?" Lalah repeated. Niles shook his head to emphasize it. "You're saying that my wife, Aurora, has not left me a letter. Despite the fact that I send thousands of those with you every time you leave for the Temple. You expect me to believe that?"

When Niles didn't respond, Lalah sighed. She opened her bag and took out a long letter. "Give this to her, then."

Niles took up his notepad again. Lalah tapped her foot in annoyance, still holding the letter in the air.

He'd scribbled: _I'm not returning._

Lalah wanted to stop him when he walked away, his tattoo of two chess pieces showing on his neck (one white, one dark), she really did. But she couldn't. She was already late.

She tucked the letter she'd written with angry and hopeful words mixed in a mess that she barely understood (but knew Aurora would have if she ever read it), and walked in a quick pace between the yellow houses over to the old Recreation Room.

She opened the door, and light flooded in from the sun outside, through the bars over the windows and from where she stood.

Owen Chauncey was tied to a chair, just buy the pool table, and she squinted at the brightness. Vincent walked past Lalah, with a wink and 'good luck' and he closed the door behind him.

"Hello," Lalah said and walked over to her.

Owen nodded shortly, but didn't say anything.

Lalah sighed when she saw the bruises on her wrists and arms. She bent down and tied the hard knots up. Owen winced.

"This ain't bad. You should see what Ben does to people he loves." Lalah tied up the last knot and walked over to sit on the pool table instead.

Owen remained on the chair, her hands trembling, but she was fighting hard not to show any pain, anything at all but security. "I didn't know he could feel that feeling."

"Oh, I didn't say it was a good thing." Lalah smiled. But then she turned serious. "I'm sorry for what he did. Ben… well, he doesn't like you. He doesn't like the fact that _we_ like you. He can be a little harsh at times, but, it's not like you've been set to be tortured or beaten up or anything like that."

"You're right," Owen said completely seriously, "all he did was kidnapping me and Claire, drug me, take my friends – really I should just send him a thank you card for hurting me."

Lalah chuckled. "Ben won't be able to hurt you, Chauncey."

"Sure he can, he's your leader, he can just wave his hand and you –"

"He's our leader. But he's not _the_ leader. He doesn't call the top shots in this joint, honey."

"Then who is?"

"Jacob." Lalah said it simply – but there was something in the way her eyes flickered – Owen saw the uncertainty in her eyes.

Lalah jumped down on the floor. "Come on. Let's go for a walk."

..

The sunlight hit Owen's face hard. It was so different from the storm from before. People were walking around outside – picking up scattered pieces of branches, furniture and other things that had been left out in the rain.

A girl caught sight of Owen, and immediately nudged the little boy on her side. They both stared at her with wide eyes, and Owen looked away.

But they weren't the only ones who were looking intently at her.

"Why are they all staring?" Owen whispered to Lalah.

"Why do you think?" Lalah picked up her pace and Owen trailed after. Some of those who were looking at her gazes' went down to her bruised and red wrists, confusion in their eyes. Owen was used to have everybody's eyes on hers, but not like this.

When she turned to look where they were going, she stopped abruptly, holding her breath when she saw Ben in the wheelchair on his porch. And the person on his side.

Jack didn't see her until she and Lalah had walked right up to them. His eyes widened slightly in surprise. "Owen?"

"Jack," Owen said back, trying to contain her shock. She swallowed. "Long time no see."

"Why is she out?" Ben turned to Lalah, not looking at Jack and Owen who were too busy staring at each other to see the irritation on his face.

"What are you doing –" She meant to say out of whatever prison he'd been in, but it didn't seem right and she stopped herself.

"Because it's a lovely day, Ben."

"I'm – uh," Jack didn't seem to find the words either, "I'm making sure Ben is all right after his surgery. You?"

"Richard's arriving today. Make sure Jim does what he's supposed to do."

"Oh, I came here willingly."

Lalah nodded. "Of course. If Felicity will let me near him."

"Why?"

They all went silent when no one knew who was talking to whom. Owen was too busy to wonder if she had heard the name 'Richard' or not. In the end, Lalah cleared her throat.

"Let's go," she said to Owen, who like a magnet followed after Lalah as they walked away from the pair.

Owen looked over her shoulder, Jack was gazing after her. She turned her head down.

"Is everyone okay? My – err, friends, I guess. Friends and friends, strange word."

Lalah smiled lightly. "That's sort of the purpose of this walk, Chauncey. Be good. And you get answers. Not to every single question, but to the ones that we know."

"So…" Owen said, after glowering at a few Others who'd stared at her, "where do you come from?"

"My mother. Most of us do."

"Most?"

Lalah laughed.

..

The light gave no color to the lifeless walls; instead it just made the corridor seem even colder. Owen and Lalah's steps echoed, and Owen was slightly amazed by that these tunnels could exist underneath such an idyllic surface.

"So… Jack… and Ben. I did not see that coming."

Lalah didn't look like she appreciated her try at a joke, and Owen went silent again.

"So," Owen said when the silent was just too much, "what are we doing here? This little… stroll is quite nice but I don't really understand the point."

Lalah stopped, just outside one of the doors. There was a fluorescent light above it, and it flickered, stuck in her eyes and Owen looked away.

"Don't freak out." It was all Lalah said before she brought out a keychain and unlocked the door. She pushed it open, and Owen peered inside.

It looked like an empty storage room, except it wasn't empty. Her eyes turned to the blankets laid out on the floor, and she barely noticed the man lying on top of them, the room wasn't very bright and he had been still.

The man looked up, his fringe falling in front of his eyes and his skin was so pale. He looked emotionless, his hands opening and closing together weakly. He opened his mouth, but it didn't look like he had the strength to say anything, let alone lift his head.

He simply blinked, groaned and closed his eyes again.

"Sean…" Owen was breathless; she threw Lalah a quick glance and saw that her head was bent down. She turned back to him and took one step forward. "Sean!"

Lalah did nothing to stop her when she hurried over to his side.

Owen lifted his head, just a little and he gazed up at here, his eyes were open but it wasn't like he really could see.

"Owen…" he whispered. He smiled softly. "Hey. Your hair is darn strange."

"Yup, you're pretty drugged there." Owen regained some snappiness in her tone. She stroked his hair back. "Just nice."

She slowly stood up, and Sean lowered his head again. She walked up to Lalah. The woman was taller than her, but it was Owen who was furious and not her.

"What the hell?"

Lalah grabbed her arm and dragged her out of the room. She slammed the door closed. "We had to drug him. He was trying to escape every other second, not even Lalita was giving us so much trouble."

"Why the hell are you even keeping him here?" Owen spat.

"Why not?"

"'Cause last time I checked he wasn't on the list!"

Lalah swallowed. "We have to keep him here." She turned to the lock and shut it.

"Why?" Owen hissed, trying to meet her gaze. "You don't need him."

Lalah's head was turned down when she sadly replied, "Yes we do."

"Why?"

"Because of Florence Bluth. We want her. And the easiest way to get her is for her to come to us. And she'll come for him." Lalah met her gaze. "Because she loves him."

"This is all about her, isn't it?

"Not everything is about her. Not you."

"You know, I sold my friends out – Wendy, Brian, for a reason. And you know what? That reason was not this!" Wendy turned around to walk around, but Lalah grabbed her upper arm in a strong grip. She winced but Lalah held on, forcing her to look at her.

"We don't like this, Chauncey. Taking – against one's will. But we have to do what's best for the island, yeah? And if you're gonna stick around – you have to understand that sometimes we need to make sacrifices."

"Yeah? What have you sacrificed?"

Lalah looked up at the roof. And Owen realized she'd hit the nail on the head. Lalah shook her head, an internal battle on whether to answer Owen's questions or not.

But before she could decide, they suddenly heard steps coming from behind them. Lalah release her arm just as someone came walking around the corner.

"Hello, Lalah," a cheerful voice said. "What are you –"

"Hello Vincent," Lalah said in the silence that followed when the man stood there gaping at them. "What're you doin' here?"

"Um, eh, I'm here to give O'Donnell his meds…" He stared at Owen, blinking he turned his gaze back on Lalah. "Dear, she shouldn't be here."

"She has permission to –"

"No, yes, I know." Vincent looked over his shoulder, a worried crease on his forehead. "But it's just – he's on his way to give –"

"What? Who?"

Owen slowly turned cold when she first saw the shadow, heard Vincent say the name but couldn't quite comprehend it, when Lalah protectively tried to take a hold of her, when the shadow turned to a person who with long secure steps came around the corner.

The man's scar had split his face into a gruesome mess. His one eye was nothing anymore. His eyebrow split into two. His nose. His lips. There was almost nothing left of the face he'd had before.

Except for his right eye, that first was confused and then turned dark at the sight of her.

Owen cleared her throat in the silence. "Huh, they weren't exaggerating when they told me I'd split your face in two."

Ethan reached for his gun.

Owen was a hell of a lot faster.

But no one was as fast as Vincent who immediately grabbed Lalah's taser and put it to Ethan's neck.

Ethan fell to the ground, passed out.

Lalah glowered at Owen. "Was that really necessary?"

Owen stared at Ethan, and what was left of his face. "He took Claire. That guy deserved what I did to him."

.. ..

Vincent took his sister's hand. "Stay."

The wind was blowing her hair in front of her face, and he stroke it away to look at her face. Thery were standing on the dock, and Julia was just on her way to board the submarine.

Julia shook her head, and a tear slipped out of her eye. "I can't. Not after – not after all the Hostiles did. Everyone… all the deaths… I can't. And I… I can't understand how you can stay with these – with these monsters!"

"They are not monsters, Julia."

Ben was with them.

"They killed everyone!" Julia screamed.

Vincent shifted uncomfortably. "Goodbye, sis."

Julia sniffed and reached into her bag. "Wait!"

Vincent turned around. She was holding out something to him. He took it. It was a photograph. A photograph of their family before it had been broken.

"Just remember what they did, Vince. Goodbye."

She climbed into the submarine. Vincent stayed until it had sunken. He stayed a long time when it was gone.

.. ..

"This is the last one," Lalah told her, after a long walk of silence, after all the screaming she'd done of course.

"Juliet? I've already know her," Owen said when they reached her house.

Lalah opened the door and walked inside. "You sure? 'Cause you never really know who Julie is, if you get my point."

Owen said in a low voice, when she saw the guards inside the house, "I really don't."

They walked down the corridor, and on the far end to the left, was a door. Owen assumed the very important person they were going to see was behind it. Lalah was getting predictable.

"Let me guess – Ana-Lucia?"

"She's dead."

Lalah opened the door.

She made no move to enter the room, so Owen went in before her.

Someone – a young woman, was sitting on the floor, her blonde hair reached only barely over her ears, and her back was aimed at the door. As Owen took another step inside, she saw that the woman with the short hair was Claire. And that she was stroking someone's hair back, someone whose face was red and swollen by bruises and blood. Someone who was unconscious.

Owen gasped when she saw that it was Brian.

Claire's head snapped around fast, and her eyes went round when she saw her. She let Brian's head gently down to the floor before she tackled Owen in a hard hug.

"_Owen, Owen, Owen_. You're here. _You_'re here. Owen. You can't _believe_ – I – he…" Claire let out a tearless sob. "Help us."

Owen pulled away from the hug, but Claire's hands were still on her shoulders.

"You okay?" Owen asked, her voice sounding too small for it to be hers.

Claire shook her head. "No, 'course I'm not, Owen. Of course I'm not. Claret's with them. Wendy – I don't know if she made it. Lalita hates me and I don't know if Allen and Maddy are alive and Brian and Boone they're – different, Owen. They're so different and everything's different – is Aaron all right? Is he? Please tell me he is. Please."

"He… he was with Charlie." Owen swallowed. A tear ran down Claire's face. "And – he's okay. As okay he can be with that guy."

Claire chocked on a laugh, and she was touching Owen's hair, her face, whispering, "Thank you, thank you, thank you."

Claire looked up, and she saw Lalah stand in the doorway, she turned her head down.

"Claire – I –" She couldn't say it.

"I know," Claire replied, sounding so broken, she chocked back another half-laugh, half-sob, "I know you're with them, Owen. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter because you saved me the last time, remember? And you can save me again. Me and everyone else. Do that, okay? Save us. Please, Owen!"

Owen nodded, her voice was full of tears when she said, "I will. Just give me some time."

When Lalah closed the door, Owen let out a sob.

"You really care 'bout her, don't you?"

Owen swallowed and wiped away her tears. "She's everything I'm not. But you know, look after number one."

"Good to see you're still you."

"So," Owen cleared her throat, "what is it you want me to do, then?"

Lalah raised an eyebrow. "That obvious?"

"Please," Owen chuckled.

"We need her," Lalah nodded at the door, "to help us."

"So Claire's important too?"

Lalah shook her head. "No, her son is."

"Then why don't you just go and grab her kid?"

"Because we can't."

"Okay, then. I'll help you gain her trust." Owen walked away from her, down the corridor. She turned her head to the side, and smiled. "Consider this my big sacrifice!"

"Actually," Lalah responded, "the sacrifice includes you killing someone."

Owen froze in her tracks.

Lalah grinned all the way when she walked up to her. She leaned down to whisper in Owen's ear, "Let's go see the man who ruined your life."

..

Author's Notes: I'm leaving for Poland tomorrow, and I won't be back until the LOST finale. (OMJ PANIC OMJ PANIC OMJ DEAD SO DEAD AND TEARS FOREVER WITH FILL THIS WORLD AND NEVER AGAIN WILL I SEE THE SUN CRYING FOREVER!) *Clears throat.* So there will be no update for a long time.

The reason this chapter is so late is because of preparation for leaving to Poland… to study English… in a land where they speak Polish… And because of the MILLIONS OF EXAMS. This week I had at least one a day, _at least. _I got into the school I wanted though, yay! But there's still the worry that they will raise the bar these last months.

The Super Secret Project you can find here:

benry . tumblr . com

(Without the spaces.)

The fact that this chapter is called Swan Song is because this is _THE_ chapter. I decided this arc after the first few chapters and the journey to finally get here has been hard. But now I'm here!

Thank you all for your reviews! And for your amazing support in this story. I love you guys. We need each other to survive the end of LOST. So hold each other's hands and pray this ain't the judgment day.

There is more to look forward to… like… uh…

Namaste.


	45. Do No Wrong

The King — _my King_ — can do no wrong.

- By Edgar Allan Poe

**. .**

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 37, Do No Wrong**

**. .**

"_The man who ruined your life._"

The man who ruined _her _life.

The man who destroyed everything.

Well, according to Lalah at least.

They walked down the corridor, walked past the door which behind Sean was, drugged to make him keep put, to control him.

Owen watched the door.

And she was, not exactly happy, but she felt thankful that she was one of those persons who never let anyone control her.

Ben was waiting for her. There was a man on crutches by his side. There was something about him that reminded her of someone, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it. He had a frown on his face. And he shifted uncomfortably, lips tightening together in irritation.

"This is Jim."

Lalah's voice broke through her barrier of thoughts. Owen looked him up and down, but failed to comment on anything. It wasn't that she couldn't speak – the words were right there on her tongue – but she didn't want to, not now. She didn't want them to know, to judge how she was feeling by her voice. She didn't want them to hear a slight shake, hoarseness or hear it break and think that she was now in their power, affected by them.

But apparently her silence was doing that for them either way, judging by the slight raise of Ben's eyebrow and smug look in his eyes.

"I don't know him," Owen said and looked away.

Lalah's hand brushed her arm. "I know, yeah. He's just here to make sure you don't get…" There was a moment of silence when she threw a glance Ben's way, "hurt, I suppose."

By the end of the corridor, there was a door. Lalah nodded when Owen looked at her confused.

Jim stopped by the door, and helped Ben turn his wheelchair around so he could face her.

"Do you want to be one of us, Owen Chauncey?"

Jim, who'd looked since Owen arrived that he wanted to be in any other place than with them, wrinkled his face in a grimace.

Owen tilted her head to the side. "Well… it depends. You see, I don't really belong to anyone for the moment. And while I said I would come with you… I don't like taking orders. Being told what to do ain't really my thing."

Owen suddenly realized that Jim wasn't grimacing of pain, but because he was trying his hardest to hold back his laughter.

Ben shook his head slightly. "You didn't understand my question. You already belong to us." He smiled. "Sorry for any confusion you might have about that, but there's no way you're leaving now. And – I just wanted to know if you're content in the position you are in now – having to prove yourself."

"Prove myself of what?"

"Of defending the island, of course."

Jim snorted, a chocked chuckle, and he cleared his throat. Ben looked slightly scandalized and stared at him.

"Uh, sorry," Jim said sheepishly, but there was a gleam in his eye. "Can we get a move on? Felicity's supposed to be checking up on me. And you know this whole falling in love with the patient thing is really working out for me, so…" He turned his head at the door.

Ben nodded.

"Wait!" Owen stopped them before they could open the door. "Look, I know you want me to prove something, sacrifice something and all that but – I don't – Lalah said I was gonna kill the man who ruined my life. And that man doesn't exist, 'cause before I was here, my life was really good. I was famous. I had money and I got to do the thing I love the most. I'm not screwed up like everyone else. So… whoever is there, behind that door, I'm not gonna hate him. No one has ruined my life."

They were all silent.

Then Lalah scoffed. "Nice speech. But you forget we know every little detail of your life, honey. Even the ones you don't know yourself. Open the door, Jimmy-boy."

Jim grimaced for real this time at the nickname, and he tried to open the door, but not without difficulty. He struggled with it for a few moments before Lalah sighed and walked past him. She looked at Owen, and she pushed it open.

Owen stared at the man tied to the chair.

He stared back.

She turned to Lalah and Ben who watched her with anticipation.

"All I see," she spat, "is the man who used to be my manager. A pathetic mess. He's _nothing_! Don't know what the hell you mean by this. If you can't see it by my intense glare I'm offended."

Sven started to protest, but whatever he was saying got muted by the gag over his mouth.

Owen tried to walk past them, but Lalah grabbed her arm.

"We know everything 'bout you, Chauncey," she snarled. She opened her bag with the other hand and took out a file. "Take a look at this. We know it all. Don't try to pretend like you've always been in control of your life. We know the truth. We've all been hurt some way or another, why's it so hard for you to admit that?"

Owen took the file, threw one last look at Sven, and she walked away.

. . . .

Owen's dreams were a mess of reality and muffled words with blurry faces. She saw blonde hair and thought it was Claire's. The smile wasn't hers either.

Overdose.

Owen closed her eyes. Didn't wonder how she could do so in a dream. And the lab coats and white bright lights disappeared.

She moved her fingers just a little, slipping just a moment back into reality.

Skin.

. . . .

They finally got a fire going. Sawyer leaned back with a content smile. Bonnie sat down too, looking at the flames lightning up the dark clearing. Behind them was a large rock protecting them – well, making them feel protected even though they were not.

Sawyer reached into his bag. "You want some?" he asked and plucked out a small bottle.

Bonnie chuckled lightly. "You brought alcohol? How did you even get that?"

Sawyer smiled at her. "I have my priorities. And I snatched it from Dominoes while he was out. I was doing him a real favor. Some people just can't handle their liquor."

Bonnie raised an eyebrow. "Uh-uh. Sure." She didn't accept the bottle he held out to her, so he took a sip himself as she continued to stare into the fire.

"This is crazy," Bonnie said after a long time of silence.

"I know. Free alcohol and you won't even –"

"The plan." She was suddenly serious when she turned to him.

"What? I haven't even told you the plan."

"Exactly."

Sawyer sighed and put the bottle back on the ground. "Look, you just need to trust me."

Bonnie sighed too. "Trust you, huh?"

"That so hard?"

Bonnie shrugged and didn't answer his question. Finally, she sighed and stood up. "I'm going to bed."

"Uh, Blondie." She stopped and turned around. He smirked. "Why don't you come over here instead?"

Bonnie smirked back. "Goodnight, Sawyer." She walked away.

"Your loss," Sawyer muttered and brought the bottle to his mouth.

. .

"Has anyone seen Ellie?" Andrea asked in the morning when she walked over to the few pieces left of the dinner table.

Hurley was trying to build a makeshift table to replace the old one, but it didn't look like it was going to work. He shook his head and stood up. "I thought she was with you."

Andrea sighed and ran her fingers through her hair. "So, she wasn't with you and Libby last night?"

Hurley shook his head again. "Nope, haven't seen her all morning. And she's really loud, for someone like, so small."

"All right, thanks, Hurley." Andrea patted him on the shoulder absently before making her way over to Margo and Zidler, who for the moment were trying to build a model of the Eiffel Tower using the shattered debris of their old shelter.

"She looked distressed," Libby said, walking over to him to help him with the table. She gave him a quick kiss on the lips before she continued, "I don't think she has been all right since Bonnie and Sawyer left. She never liked being a leader. Even though she's good at taking charge."

Hurley smiled, but looked a little sad. "Where do you think Ellie is?"

"Hiding," Libby said simply. "I think maybe I should talk to her, when Andy finds her. The girl… she's been through much of her age. And with the death of Charlie…"

They both went silent after that, thinking of their friend.

"Who's gonna talk on the funeral… memorial… thing," Hurley broke the silence.

"I think Zidler's going to say a few words, actually." Libby looked over where Andrea, Zidler and Margo were talking. "I think they were very close."

"We were all friends with Charlie. I just…" Hurley looked down. "I don't understand how he could do that to Kate."

"I do," Libby said, "this island, all of us stuck here, it drives people over the edge. But… I wish I couldn't understand either."

. .

"Kate!"

Kate turned around, surprised at hearing her name. People had been avoiding her. Because of everything that had happened with Charlie of course. Andrea jogged over to her side by the water.

"I, uh, what is it?" She looked up at the camp, trying to see where Dom was.

"Have you seen Ellie?"

Kate shook her head. "No." She saw Kaylee and Sun carrying fruit, but no sign of her brother.

Andrea sighed. "Okay." She began to walk away. Kate turned around.

"Wait!" she shouted and Andrea stopped. "When…" She swallowed hard. "When is… the funeral gonna be?"

"At sundown," Andrea replied without looking at her.

. .

Jim, having escaped Felicity once again (or well, she'd thrown him out. But it wasn't like he had spilled tea all over her notes on purpose or anything), knocked on the door.

"Oh, hello," he said cheerfully when Garrett opened the door. "It's me. Remember me? You threw me out and told me to never come back when you found me in Maddy's room, once. But now when I got crutches there's no way you can do that, see, I'm a cripple and people are always nice to 'em. So, can I come in?"

Garrett sighed deeply but didn't move.

Jim tried to make the puppy-dog eyes look.

Garrett sighed again and stepped aside.

Jim sat down on the couch. He waited to speak until Garrett, though there was a perfectly comfortable sofa, sat down on a chair.

"Maddy's gone," Jim stated.

Garrett said nothing, but he nodded.

"That's… that's not good y'know." He swallowed. "And she's not in the Flight 815's camp. And you haven't found her. And all you know is that she got shot."

Silence.

"What're you gonna do 'bout it?"

"I do not need to speak of this with you," Garrett said sternly, looking forward the entire time.

But Jim was looking at him, and he knew Garrett could feel his gaze, could feel the determination. "I'm her best friend. You can pretend and lie all you want, but I have always been. And you're her dad whether she likes it or not. We've seen her in her worst and best. We _know _her. So, what are we gonna do about that?"

Garrett stood up and slowly walked over to the window. "Madeline is gone because she was trying to help Claire."

"So she cares about her?"

"Yes. Very much. I believe she would do anything to protect her."

"They barely know each other."

"As you said, we both know Madeline. We know she can feel a great deal."

"So, she will try to help her escape again?"

Garrett shook his head. "It's too dangerous for the both of them. She wants to help Claire but cannot do so when she is here."

Jim nodded, he understood. "We need to talk with Owen Chauncey, don't we?"

. .

Zidler cleared his throat. "Charlie Pace, he had a middle name but trying to pronounce it would make –" Zidler stopped when he saw Wendy shake her head while she was cutting the mango in pieces.

"All right. Charlie Hieroblablabla Pace. He was a good man. He was a good man until he died. Even though Dom says he tried to –"

Wendy shook her head again and grabbed the second mango.

"Charlie Pace. He was famous. He lived a good life. But it was cut short when Dom –"

Wendy shook her head.

"Charlie Pace was awesome. He had a middle name. Dom should be lying in the grave instead. Rest in pea – Ouch! Wendy! Stop throwing mangoes at me!"

"Hey, what are you doing?" Bernard asked, taking one of the pieces of mango. Wendy immediately snatched it out of his hand and threw it at Zidler. He ducked and straightened his back completely unfazed.

"I'm training for my speech for the funeral, you know, it's gonna be epic. I'm thinking of creating fire with my bare hands, not a bonfire but flames and maybe some explosions with glitter for extra effect. Now I just need to find some glitter. Maybe some of Shannon's old clothes have some, gotta go look." Zidler wandered off. And Bernard was left gaping after him.

"He's handled Charlie's death extremely well," he said in surprise.

Wendy shook her head.

Margo came up behind them. "No, he hasn't, Bernard. None of us have, least of all him."

. .

She held the file in her hands.

Owen looked out over the water. It was… quite idyllic. Of course if you looked too much into details you would see branches and debris in the waves – fallen trees on the land. But that wasn't the point.

"Hello."'

She turned around when she heard his voice.

She smiled and stopped twitching, becoming calm on her exterior."Hello, hello, Richard."

Richard didn't smile, but he didn't look unkind either. "How are you?"

Owen shook her head. "No time for small talk."

He nodded at the file she was holding. "You read it?"

Owen held it out towards him. "Yup. I read it. Have you?"

Richard chuckled a little. Owen had heard Richard chuckle a lot, laugh, and snicker. But she knew from the reactions of the Others when they heard him do that, that that wasn't a usual thing for him to do. This one was slightly nervous. "That… that doesn't matter."

"I'm serious," Owen said, "which doesn't happen very often. Everything at this moment matters. And if I'm gonna kill someone; I need you to read this." She raised her eyebrows. And he finally took the file from her hands.

Owen walked past him.

"Is this all you want to talk about?" Richard shouted after her.

Owen smiled but didn't turn around. "It was good to see you again!"

. . . .

"Open your mouth."

Owen happily obliged as the doctor helped her swallow the pill.

"Y-you know," Owen said, water dripping down her chin, "I'm famous."

"I know." The doctor didn't have any humor, or awesomeness, obviously. Otherwise her reaction should've been more yelling and jumping and asking for autographs.

The doctor started to walk away. She had blonde hair, kind of like an annoying pregnant chick Owen knew, once, now, sometime later.

"W-Why are… don't… w-why are y-you closin' the door?"  
Owen decided she didn't like the doctor. If she didn't take the pills – the doctor would be upset. Excellent.

. . . .

"Locke, hey! Have you seen –" Andrea stopped abruptly when she saw Locke zip the backpack up. "What are you doing?"

Locke turned around to face her. "I'm leaving for the caves… to get some water."

"And you need a gun for that?"

Locke looked down at the gun in the holster. He looked up again and sighed. "What is it, Andy?"

"You're not going anywhere, _John._ Not with what's happened."

"Last time I checked this wasn't a dictatorship." He smiled. "I can go to the caves if I wa–"

"You know," Andrea took a step closer to him, but he looked completely calm despite the poisonous tone in her voice, "people say 'the caves' but they really mean they're going away for quite a long time, most times they don't come back, and they go to seek out the Others."

"I'm going after Sawyer and Bonnie."

Andrea crossed her arms. "And why are you doing that?"

"Why is my own business. Charlie's funeral is tonight. But I've already made my peace with him. And I'm taking this gun, because there are a lot of dangerous animals in that jungle – you know that. And don't you even think of following me. The camp needs you now. Kim needs you." Locke turned around and started to walk towards the trees.

"I'm not their leader!" Andrea shouted.

"Right now you're the only one they have." Locke looked at her over his shoulder. "I'll keep an eye out for Ellie too. But I think we both know that she hasn't wandered off on her own."

Andrea stayed there until he was gone. She wiped away furious tears that threatened to fall from her eyes and turned around. She saw Frederic Phelps staring at her. She glared until he looked away.

She turned away from him and walked towards the group. "Hey!" she shouted. "Listen up!"

They soon started to gather around her.

"Ellie's gone, now, I know what you're all thinking. It can be the Others, but there's no need to freak out at the moment. We got our guards – we got our traps. I want you to sort yourself into groups, look through the traps, the jungle, ask around if anyone saw anything. 'Cause I need to go and check up on Kim. Now. All right?"

They nodded a bit nervously, looking at each other.

At least Jack had the gift of having the last name Shephard, Andrea thought a bit bitterly.

. .

"You should help too," Wendy said when the other survivors were scattered on the beach and in the jungle looking for the little girl, her name was Eloise, Fred remembered, Eloise Harwood.

Fred looked nervously at Jin and Sun Kwon who just walked into the jungle. "Are you sure?" He pushed his glasses further up his nose. "No one – they don't –"

"Do you want me to look all by myself?" Wendy asked. "And besides, Margo is worried 'bout you. More worried than usual. All those maternal instincts kicking in."

"And the fact that I told you rescue was coming." Fred struggled to stand up.

Wendy helped him. "You told us your team was coming. No one here yet. People are starting to grow less suspicious and more angry. Especially with all that's happened."

"Maybe," Fred said as they started walking side by side, "the storm has ruined some of their communications. It's possible the rest of my team have been waiting for me to find them. Or maybe –"

"Lots of maybes." And that was the last thing Wendy said when they joined Margo and Zidler.

When you were quiet, and always had to be in the background of things, you noticed a lot. Fred was used to be a listener. And he listened intently – even though it seemed almost like he wasn't there – to Zidler and Margo bickering and laughing, a façade, because they were both very broken. There was something very sad in Zidler's eyes and something very sad in Margo's tone and every time they looked at Wendy who was completely silent it only got worse.

They returned to the camp without much done. Zidler was getting even more miserable, and thus he tried to make more jokes, and he disappeared off to try to finish his speech. Margo looked very pale and decided to go rest.

Fred was wondering if he could get some fruit. He was hungry.

But the absolute 'I will murder you with my brain' look Rose and her husband Bernard gave him, made him stand back. They didn't even want his help to rebuild. He wasn't the Joker! He wasn't going to burn them up for fun!

Fred sat down on his usual spot by the tree, and he looked out at the ocean. He wanted off the island. He wanted off it _now_. But there were things he had to do, promises to keep, people – person to find.

. .

"I – I was trying to make a speech."

They had the funeral in the evening.

Kate looked down at the grave, listening absently to Zidler's words, too busy feeling guilty. Her arms were folded over her chest, and Kaylee put an arm around her shoulder to comfort her.

"But… I wasn't really getting' anywhere."

Wendy smiled sadly at that. She was standing on Zidler's right side, Margo on the other. Behind them, as always far from the group was Fred, watching the scene solemnly. He was bit by bit putting the survivors' past together. And all the graves were a part of that story.

Zidler took a deep breath. "I want to say that – that Charlie Pace was my friend. And he was y'know, awesome. And Wendy thinks he was actually a really good singer. Wished we'd told you that more times…" Zidler cleared his throat, and the survivors waited for him to continue – but he didn't say anything. The words got stuck in his throat.

"I…" Margo took a step forward. "Charlie was really nice, and he was funny. And I think – I think he sometimes felt like he didn't belong, but he did. And…" She glanced Kate's way, "he did no wrong."

Hurley walked over to them, Libby trailing behind with Aaron in her arms. "Charlie – that dude was awesome. He took care of Claire's baby when she was gone, and though he complained – he really liked the little guy." He smiled at Aaron who gurgled happily. "He was a good guy. He was my friend. I'll…" Hurley looked down, and there were tears in his yes, "I'll… I'll miss him…"

"I'll miss him too," Libby said.

"He was nice when we got here. He didn't welcome us with open arms. But he didn't need to. He knew what he cared about, and that was good." Andrea felt her words weren't enough, but that was all she could say, if she said anything more like: _I'll miss him. He was a very, very good friend. Why the hell is he dead damn it_? She would break down in tears. She hoped the others understood that she meant all that anyway.

"He was funny," Kaylee said.

And that, that was really not enough. But Kaylee didn't seem to be able to say anything either, with the tears falling down her face.

"I… I didn't know Charlie." Desmond looked at his sister on his side. "But what I know of him – he was a good person. I know it's been said. But it can be said again. There are not enough of those left in the world, not when I left it. I'm glad to have known you Charlie Pace, if briefly."

"Despite it all," Lori said, ignoring the hand that Desmond held out to her, "you still had some goodness in you. I'm glad you weren't entirely gone yet. I'm glad."

Everyone seemed a little put off by her comment, especially Zidler, who was staring at her with something dark in his eyes. It wasn't until Wendy elbowed him that he spoke up again.

"Goodbye, Charlie." Zidler cleared his throat. "You mattered. You mattered a lot to us all."

It felt like the end. But it wasn't.

Sun took Jin's hand when they saw Dom walk towards them from the jungle. They all watched him curiously, some started to whisper.

He had the guitar.

"Um," Dom said, not meeting anyone's eye. "I thought… maybe, he should have this, it wouldn't, uh, be right, without it."

When no one said anything, Dom himself put the guitar in the grave.

He bit his lip. Kaylee smiled softly – because Kate was biting her lip in the exact same way.

Dom finally met someone's gaze. Margo looked worriedly at Zidler, completely expressionless stared at Dominic.

It all happened too quickly. No one had time to react before Zidler tackled Dom to the ground. Dom just laid there on the sand and it was impossible to tell if it was from the surprise or not.

When the blood started pouring out from his nose – Kate and Wendy both ran forward. Wendy grabbed Zidler's shoulders, trying to pull him off.

Kate punched Zidler in the face. Zidler stumbled back and both he and Wendy fell in a tangle on the ground.

Kate helped Dom stand up, holding an arm around him, her eyes telling everyone to back the hell away from her brother.

Wendy untangled herself from Zidler and took four quick strides towards the siblings –

The survivors stood there in shock.

– And Margo fell to her knees when she couldn't breathe.

. .

"How… w-what is it?" Fox asked, looking at Andrea when she groaned in frustration.

"Can you go see how much is left of the antibiotics?" Andrea tried to keep her voice steady. But there was something in her way that she stroke Kim's hair back and her shoulders tensed and the way she was biting her lip.

She was not just worried, she was frustrated.

Margo was close by, Sun and Libby by her side. Zidler was off to try to find her inhalers, if she had one left. Margo was mumbling fast and incoherent about her baby and death.

Andrea tried to keep Margo's words out of her ears and concentrated on Kim.

"What's w-wrong?" Fox asked.

"Her leg's been infected!" Andrea shouted. "So get me the sodding antibiotics _now_!"

Fox hurried away, because he was determined to help Kim in every way he could.

"But you know what?" Andrea said softly to Kim who was wondrously still not good enough to hear a thing. "I'm going to be the one that saves you."

. .

Owen sat on the park bench under the tree. The sun was hiding behind gray clouds but the air was still humid, still she wrapped the jacket she'd got tighter around her.

"Ben doesn't like to not get the last word."

Lalah didn't wait for an invitation. She sat down on the other end of the bench.

Owen raised her eyebrows, but was very careful not to look at Lalah. "With killing him – what the hell will I prove?"

"Don't ya wanna kill him?"

She could feel Lalah's gaze on her. Owen shrugged.

"Didn't you read the file –"

"I read it," Owen cut off.

"Then I honestly how no idea why you wouldn't wanna kill the man."

"So," Owen huffed out a laugh, "this is how you roll. Murder. Who did you kill to get into the popular kids' gang?"

"I've killed lots of people." Lalah said it as carelessly as everything she did seem to be. "But there was no bloodshed to get accepted into this pretty place."

Owen grimaced childishly. "Then… why do I have to do it?"

"'Cause you have to let go."

"I already have." Owen struggled to her feet. She swayed a little, but her eyes just went more intense as they glowered into Lalah's. "I have let go. You don't have to slice someone's throat to move on. Geez, no wonder you guys are all so freakin' messed up. This island should have its own private therapy group, because _seriously._ You should call it Others Anonymous." She raised her hand. "Hello, I have been an Other for eight years. Today I've kidnapped four chicks, one who was five months pregnant. I haven't killed anyone in fifteen days. Feel sorry for me!"

"I do." Lalah said it with complete honesty, and something much like pity in her eyes.

Owen exhaled deeply, letting all her anger flood out of her until there was only resignation. "I'm gonna help you with Claire. Why can't that be enough? Come on."

"Because it's not enough for Ben. Don't ya understand, Chauncey? Think with that brain of yours for a moment of _why_ he is asking you to do this."

This time it was Lalah who walked away.

. . . .

She didn't know where she was.

Owen opened her eyes.

"Calm down. Calm down."

The voice was soothing, but Owen was not about to calm down. She raised her head, and realized she'd fallen asleep in a chair. Her body ached, but it was the distance kind of pain. The voice was too far away – just like her feelings.

"Owen? Owen?"

Owen saw his eyes. They were dark. Dark eyelashes too. She told him so. He smiled. She liked him. He didn't try to give her any pills. She didn't like the room. It was too cold and then too warm and it was too sterile and she wanted to see Claire.

_Soon_, he said.

"I'm Richard."

. . . .

"The baby's _dying_."

"No, it isn't."

"I'm dying."

"No you're not."

"I – I don't feel like I'm living."

Libby paused and looked Margo directly in the eye. "The baby is alive. You are alive. But if you give up – it will too. So you have to stop panicking."

"I don't need your help."

"Yes you do. This baby is all of ours."

. .

"You're lost."

"I'm not lost."

"You have no idea where we're going."

"C'mon, show some trust."

Bonnie laughed and pulled the branch back that Sawyer had let back in her face. "If we don't get eaten by a polar bear – then yeah, maybe."

"I know where we're going, Princess. But you might get a little wet. You up for that?"

Bonnie frowned, hoping she'd heard wrong. "And… that's supposed to mean...?"

Sawyer turned around with a smirk. "Just through the trees, you'll see."

She followed him between two fallen trees, through a clearing with grass that had been flattened by the storm, and beneath low branches. _Just though the trees_, her ass.

"What will you do when we get rescued?"

Bonnie shrugged absently. She wasn't aware that there would even be any rescue, Sawyer hadn't seemed too hopeful either. But Sawyer was having none of that. He picked up his pace until he was right beside her, but she was still not turning her concentration at him.

"Well," Sawyer said with a meaning smile, "I was thinkin' big house, white picket fence, a tower we can lock Eva in when she starts dating."

"Huh. That'll work well." Bonnie looked down, and there was something sad in her eyes. "I – I got two kids, Sawyer."

"Well, you're not the only one with offspring, Mama Bear."

They reached a small stream.

"Wait!" Sawyer said when she'd taken three steps into the water. "We're not goin' in there."

"You said we were getting' –"

"Well," Sawyer smiled, "it was funny to see you ruin your clothes."

Bonnie ran up from the water and before Sawyer could react she'd pushed him in the creek.

She laughed as he sputtered out the water, blinking and looking up at her.

"It could've been deep!" Sawyer splashed in the water, his hair falling in front of his eyes and he looked so off-guard. The entire act he put on all the time was off and it was just him. Bewildered, offended, sure, but it was real.

Bonnie continued to laugh.

Sawyer muttered curses under his breaths and threats when he was somewhat dry again and they were walking by the stream. Bonnie was careful not to get too close to him – he could still push her in the water too after all. And it was easy, as Bonnie smirked and Sawyer grimaced to forget what they were walking to.

But when they reached the small lake, its colors icier than any water she'd seen on the island, it all came back. Because sitting on a stone, just on the edge of the water and land was Florence.

Their best friend's murderer.

. .

"Ben!" Claret shouted a little too loudly when she stepped inside his house. She didn't bother to take her shoes off when she half-ran into his living room. "I need to talk with you –"

She stopped abruptly when she saw Jack there. He turned around with raised eyebrows. Ben moved the tower on the chessboard, before he too turned to Claret.

"You all right?"

Claret saw her reflection in the mirror behind Ben. She was extremely white in the face. Jack looked quite pale too. Claret remembered their last, well, last real meeting (she'd caught a glimpse of him when she let Sean into his cell and on the boat). It hadn't been – Claret had been screaming at him to save Jim's life.

"I –" Claret tore her eyes away from Jack. "I need to speak to you alone."

Ben nodded. "Of course. You mind?"

Claret thought she was about to have a heart attack when she realized Ben was asking Jack if it was okay for him to leave.

"No." Jack shook his head.

They went back to the kitchen. The door was still open and Claret wondered if Jack would be listening in on their conversation.

Claret decided to go straight to the topic. "The ritual tonight. With Owen and –" her killing someone – "what does it mean for you?"

"This is just one of the many, many steps she will have to take."

"Yes, but…" She wasn't sure how to say it. "From what I have heard – it seems like – everyone thinks she's going to be the new – well, the new you."

"Why does it matter to you?" asked Ben.

"It matters because being the leader…" Claret smiled a little. "You seem to love it."

"What you love is mostly taken away from you, isn't it?"

"I guess it is."

Ben smiled. "Claret, would you like to go over and tell Owen what she's supposed to do?"

"You – you haven't told her yet?"

Ben shrugged. "I guess I've been busy."

Claret doubted that.

. .

"Howdy!"

Flor shot up and whirled around. She stumbled a few steps in the water, staring at them with wide eyes. She pulled her dark hair back nervously. She swallowed hard.

Bonnie didn't say anything. Sawyer walked over to Flor who slowly made her way up on land.

She smoothed out her dress with one hand; in the other she held documents. She opened her mouth to say something.

Bonnie looked away and reached for her gun.

"Lookin' for this?" Sawyer held up two guns in the air.

Bonnie turned to him, her eyes glowing in anger. "When the hell did you take it?"

"When you pushed me in the water. As a precaution. You said you weren't gonna try to put a bullet through her head but a man's gotta have a little insurance."

Bonnie looked at Florence. And now she saw more than the quick glance had given her.

Flor had horrible bruises all over her skin. Some looked like they might have been infected. Her eyes were big, round and Bonnie liked to think they were scared. She wondered what'd happened to her in the storm. If those cuts and bruises were from the jungle or from something else.

She refused to feel sorry for her. She refused to.

"All right then." Bonnie dropped her backpack on the grass. "Tell me everything."

"Well, you see –"

"You weren't supposed to bring her!"

It was the first words Flor had uttered since they got there. Bonnie had almost forgotten her voice.

"As I said, a man's gotta have a little insurance. And if you try to double-cross me or y'know, _survive_ – I will give her, her gun back with a map to just where you are."

"Fine," Flor muttered, but her eyes were blank. "But just – fill me in first on the camp."

"Why would we do that?" Bonnie asked.

"Because…" Flor looked down.

Sawyer turned to Bonnie. "She pretends she still cares about us."

"I do care!" Flor yelled.

Bonnie didn't look angry any more, just tired. "Did you care when you shot Rosalie in the gut?"

"No matter what I say…" Flor mumbled. "But okay. You won't tell me – _okay_. Just if we go through the plan…"

"The plan?"

"Sawyer didn't tell you?"

Bonnie glared at Sawyer.

"Look," he said, "we both need to tell ya – 'cause the plan is so crazy that if I'd told you – you wouldn't have believed me. I need her to explain too."

"Then… we make camp. And catch up." Bonnie opened her backpack to take out a bottle of water.

. .

"Are you okay?" Margo and Zidler asked each other at the exact same time.

"Peachy," Zidler said and tried to stop his bleeding nose.

"Same here," Margo said and tried to smile.

They both started to laugh at each other's failed attempts at calming each other, and then they both started to cough.

"I can't believe you beat up Dom."

"I can see red sometimes too."

"No, I mean – he's you know all muscles and stuff and you're like –" Margo giggled and slid away to the other side of Owen's shelter when Zidler tried to reach her with his swinging arm.

"Glad we're peachy."

"Absolutely."

..

Owen had gotten her own house. But she wasn't stupid enough to think they weren't watching her. She rubbed her eyes, yawning, when there was a nervous knock on the door.

She got up from the couch and opened it hesitantly.

"Claret?"

"Me." Claret smiled. "Hi, Owen."

Owen tried to close the door. Claret was a lot stronger than she looked and pushed it open. She stepped inside the hall.

"It's nice."

Owen looked at the sickly green walls. "Do you need glasses?"

Claret swallowed. "We haven't seen each other in a long time –"

"You expect a hug?" Owen flopped down on the couch again.

"We are both with them."

"How long?"

"Since the first day of the crash."

"Nice."

"Not really."

They looked at each other. Owen smirked. "How much would you wanna bet the camps is hatin' on us right now?"

Claret made a forced smile and sat down on a chair. She swallowed. "Uh, Ben wanted me to tell you that… it's going to happen tonight."

"Well, you tell him he has to take me out for dinner first."

"No – you – making the sacrifice."

"Aha, the cult ritual."

"It's not a cult ritual."

"Just ritual then," muttered Owen.

"You don't understand… Why don't you understand?" Claret looked sad. "All of these people look at you… they expect something…"

"They look at me like I'm the second coming, I know. But I am _not_. Can you please leave?"

"Someone will come and pick you up."

"So Ben's finally making that dinner?"

Claret nervously looked down, she didn't say anything until she carefully sat down in an armchair. "What did Sven do to you?"

"Nothing."

"Really?" Claret asked.

Owen nodded.

"But… then why would Ben want you to do this?"

Owen didn't have an answer to that.

..

"Maybe I should move to the caves," Dom suggested.

"_NO ONE_ is going to the caves!" Andrea yelled when she passed by with water for Kim.

Kate smiled. "You heard her."

"I can't stay here," Dom protested.

"Because everyone is looking at you strangely? We were on the run from murder. You should be used to having people hate you."

"Not people I care about."

Kate was silent.

Dom was silent.

Kate continued to be silent.

Dom raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"I'm waiting for the sarcastic reply," Kate told him completely serious. "So I would know you aren't a space alien."

"You're cute when you try to pretend you have a sense of humor."

Kate stuck her tongue out at him.

"Oh sorry." Kaylee held a plate with food which she gave to Dom. "We must have travelled back in time to where you both were under five. Let me just leave…"

Kate grabbed her arm and made her sit down. "What are we going to do?"

"What we always do," Dom answered.

"Run?" Kaylee shook her head. "I'm done with that."

"Lie and survive."

..

Owen had gotten her own house. But she wasn't stupid enough to think they weren't watching her. She rubbed her eyes, yawning, when there was a sharp knock on the door.

It felt a little like déjà vu.

"I've read it."

Richard, she should've known. He held the file in one hand and he was looking at her – oh gosh with that pitying face.

She for one moment regretted her decision of showing him the endless letters concluding and summarizing her life. Because now it seemed that Richard thought, at least by the look on his face, why she was and acted the way she did.

"Can I come in?"

Owen pondered on the question for a moment. "Nope."

Richard looked stunned. "Uhm." He swallowed.

"Somethin' caught in your throat?"

"I just thought you would –" He stopped himself. Finally noticing his own irrational behavior when the old couple next door threw him a look. "Ben sent me here."

"'Course he did," Owen muttered.

"It's going to be an execution," Richard said.

Owen didn't have the strength to sound spiteful, she was too tired. "In front of everyone rituality and stuff, blah blah blah, real interesting. But I'm skipping this one. Goodbye." Owen closed the door right in his face.

"Owen!" Richard shouted, and opened the door again. He followed her inside. "Have they not explained the situation –?"

"They've explained that I'm supposed to kill the man who ruined my life. All they have is Sven. I thought they would bring at least Charlie…"

"How can you say this man has not ruined your life?"

"Because he _hasn't_." Owen turned around to sit in the swivel armchair. "He was just this kid who went to my high school. He was just this guy who was my manager. I'm not gonna kill him in like two seconds just because you want me to."

Richard opened the file and ripped out a page. He handed it to Owen who threw one look at it without any interest.

"Oh, right. When I fell down the stairs."

"When you were pushed down by Sven."

Owen chuckled lightheartedly. "That sounds a little bit too drama soap-ish for me."

"They found old cuts and bruises on your body that weren't from the fall that almost broke your back if it hadn't been for one talented surgeon. Three days earlier you called 911 saying someone was in your house."

"I was having a nightmare. And then they found a scared little squirrel in the kitchen. No big deal. Except that it had stolen one of my favorite amber necklaces."

"When you recovered from the hospital you took a one year break from the stage, from singing, from any public appearances."

"And I spent all that time working on my tan. Sometimes famous people gotta relax." Owen stood up from the chair and she stepped right up into Richard's personal space. He immediately took one step back. She immediately followed him. "I wanted you to read that file. Because I wanted you to realize that you got your facts wrong. This whole thing is a messed up mix of conspiracy theories and lies that seem to have been whispered from one ear to another until it reached yours. This just makes me wonder how much you really know about us. And how much you _think _you know. And really, I wanna meet the person who wrote this, 'cause whoever it is can write a hell of a good drama. You guys are not in as much control as I thought. So no, I'm not gonna grab the knife from Ben and I'm not going to the ritual so just lock the poor guy up again."

Richard nodded.

"Good. Get out of my house. I need my beauty sleep."

. .

"Don't you think the Others have realized that you've stolen their important files? And who leaves them lying around anyway?"

"Someone who was looking after the same thing I was," Flor snapped back at Bonnie. "When I was out here trying to survive through the storm…" Flor bit her lip and her eyes grew distant before she went back to reality. "I did a lot of thinking. My – some files didn't have anything in them. Things were carelessly put on the desk – and I think – I think someone had been in that room right before me. Janna – the woman from the freighter – well, she made hints that there was someone helping us. I think these are real."

Bonnie squinted at the maps. They hadn't made a fire and Sawyer had turned off the flashlight just as soon Flor had showed them to her. "What if Janna wasn't who she said she was?"

"She was. She was a prisoner. She killed them. And… those people, from the freighter. I know they're dangerous because she was."

"That's why you killed Naomi?" Bonnie snapped.

"Well, when you two ladies are done theorizing wake me up." Sawyer yawned.

"We don't have time for sleep," Flor protested. "We have to go now." She gracefully got up on her feet.

"Hold your horses, Miss-I-Shoot-People." Sawyer struggled up clumsily. "Where are we goin' to?"

"We have to get some explosives." Flor told them in a tone that just as well could have been: 'We're going for some milk.'

"_The Black Rock_?" Bonnie asked, getting up to her feet also. She brushed dirt off her clothes and crossed her arms.

Flor put the backpack on over her shoulders. She didn't say anything.

Sawyer sighed and turned to Bonnie. "Look at the maps, Blondie. She wants us to go to one of their stations."

"No." Flor looked intently at the ground. "Not all of us. Bonnie, you don't have to come."

"Let's just go on this stupid suicide – whatever – mission." Bonnie took the lead.

. .

Andrea lowered her head when the last search team returned to the camp without having found Ellie anywhere.

She saw Libby out of the corner of her eye, walking towards her, probably to say some comforting words or try to understand her. Andrea covered her right ear, drowning out the sounds.

It wasn't until Fox put a shaking hand on her shoulder and told her Kim was awake again that she started to listen once more.

. .

Owen pulled the pillow over her head to drown out the sound of the door bell. Just a few minutes later the pillow was snatched away. She groaned but refused to open her eyes.

"Get up."

"You sneak into half-naked girls' rooms often?"

Lalah laughed quietly. Owen heard her walk away. She forced herself to sit up.

When she came into the kitchen there was a cup of coffee on the table. Owen thanked the gods as she took the first sip. It almost burned off her tongue. She spluttered it out and she saw Lalah smirk when she sat down on the opposite side of the table.

"This my punishment?" Owen asked, glowering as much as she could with her still half-open eyes. "You should know I'll keep singing even if I lose my throat."

"Chauncey, I'm sure you can define all biological laws. For an example, yesterday you ignored Ben's orders and you're still alive to see the next bright sunny day. That's quite an achievement. But don't think you're out of the woods yet."

"Mhmm." Owen took another, now more careful sip of the coffee.

"Richard…" Lalah looked at Owen with her dark brown eyes. "He told me what you said."

"No surprise there."

"Is it true? That Sven has done nothin' to you?"

Owen nodded, staring down at the swirls in the mug.

Lalah shrugged. "Figures."

Owen glanced up. "What?"

"Ben is intimidated by you. By what you're supposed to be to us. What you can be if you prove yourself worthy. He's placed you in a real bad position. Either you'll kill the man he says, the file says ruined your life. Or you're weak. Simple as that. His word against yours. And to be honest, we've known him longer. And after last night – everybody thinks exactly what he wants them to think. That you aren't worthy. That you can't even _try_."

Their eyes met.

"So," Owen tilted her head to the side, "did you guys lock him up? Where exactly?"

. . . .

There was still some blood on the floor.

Owen tilted her head. Knife. Sharp. Skin and flesh cutting easily. Bones were harder to break.

"You shouldn't have done that to Ethan," Richard told her over the screaming.

She took his hand and giggled because she couldn't remember where she was. "I had to."

. . . .

They'd locked him up in the same room.

Owen glanced quickly at the door where she knew Sean was kept behind.

She looked around the corner where she'd seen Ethan. She wondered what'd happened to him.

Lalah had made sure that people knew that Owen was about to see Sven. So that people would know it wasn't over. That Owen might still, you know, kill him. They were all pretty bloodthirsty.

"I want to talk to him alone. Since I hate him and all."

Lalah looked like she was trying really hard not to roll her eyes. "Be sure not to kill him while no one's around to watch."

"I'll try to contain myself."

Lalah opened the door and closed it behind her.

They were alone.

Sven immediately started to try to talk behind the gag. Owen rolled her eyes. "No one can hear any word you're saying. Not even if you started screaming."

Owen slowly walked towards him. "I have no idea how you ended up here. But I was here on a plane. But you – you probably already know that, don't you? Always keeping track."

Sven quieted but he continued to mumble.

Owen smiled, looked down and shook her head. "They say you ruined my life. They want me to kill you. In front of absolutely every frickin' person in their little town. Slice your throat. They want it to be messy."

She tilted her head to her side and looked at him. "You can stop trying to get free from your binds – I'm not gonna kill you, Sven. In fact I've already convinced half of them that I don't care about you at all. That you are nothing but my manager. A guy that means nothing. So… I don't think they're gonna force me to murder you just yet."

She knelt down in front of him, and she grinned. "They want your death to be messy – but fast. But you know what, Sven? You know why I have lied so that you won't die – it's not because I don't want you to bite the dust. It's 'cause I want you to be afraid. I want you to sit in this room and know that soon – very soon I'm finally gonna pick up that knife – and it might be in front of everyone here – and it might just be you and me. And when I do that, Sven. When I pick up the knife I'm not gonna let it be quick. It's going to be slow. And it's going to be absolutely wonderful to see you slowly bleed out in agony and it's gonna take hours and hours of you begging me to finish you off before you die and go to hell."

Sven's eyes were wide in fear.

Owen chuckled. "How does it feel like to not be in control?"

. .

Fred had made his decision. He'd taken some of the fruit and water and hidden it in his emptied backpack. It wasn't exactly the best of preparations – but there weren't anything else he could bring. He couldn't stay there anymore, with the survivors that didn't trust him, didn't seem to want to trust him to save them all, and he didn't even know if he could. The rest of his team where somewhere out there on the island and he had to find them and get going. And he needed to find the person everybody here seemed to hate too.

Sneaking out of the camp during the day might seem stupid, foolish. But it was during the night they kept the most watchful eye on him. And now with the little girl Eloise, Ellie, gone and with Wendy Reyes' depression and with Kimika Yamazaki – the Japanese – dying and with everyone kidnapped and with –

Yeah, nobody would worry about him, would they?

He pushed his glasses further up his nose. Looked over at the camp in the distance – he thought he could see Zidler and Margo over there – he started to walk towards the jungle.

He stopped abruptly, so fast he almost fell over, when he saw two figured emerge from the trees.

"Phelps," Miles Straume said. He didn't sound surprised at all. At his side Milou Van Dyck smiled, leaning on a long stick. She pushed her straggly blonde hair behind her, looking over at the camp with worry.

Fred was in too much shock to utter a single word.

"So," Miles said, waving a hand in front of Fred's face, "you're not gonna introduce us to your friends?"

. .

**Author's Notes: **…

Yeah…

About Owen…

Anyway, had my birthday last week and now I'm OLD! This is all very terrifying. Then I colored my hair fire-red so that I could stop cars by simply existing. Now I'm waiting for the Tardis. In case you haven't noticed – I'm taking LOST ending extremely well. Now excuse me as I go away to write my very thick book called _WHY?_

Today is my last day of school. So, yeah, I've been extremely busy. I'm emotional since all of my friends are going to different towns for different schools next year and I'm gonna actually miss my class and my teachers. So… cheer me up?

Namaste.


	46. A Wild and Waking Thought

_A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
_With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,  
_Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would control,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
For that bright hope at last  
And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

. .

**Do you believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 38, A Wild and Waking Thought**

. .

Forgive, but don't forget.

Sometimes it's the other way around. Forgetting something's been done can be easy, if you try, but the unspoken forgiveness will always lie between like a thick brick wall.

Say: "I forgive you." But not mean it, that can mean forgive, but don't forget too. But most often it means that you're forgiving because you have to, not because you want to.

At times, that can be enough.

. .

Flor saw a cow.

It happened after long arguments, discussions and looks that were meant to kill.

"So what?" Bonnie said. "We're just gonna stumble upon the Others?"

"We have the map," Sawyer said, but he didn't sound too convinced either.

Bonnie snorted. "Then why have we gone past this tree twice already?" She pointed at it to make her point.

"Because Sawyer can't read a map." Flor snatched the paper out of his hands and jumped out of his way when he tried to take it back.

Bonnie nodded to herself and smiled. "I can believe that."

"You're hurting my feelings. Truly," Sawyer sarcastically replied, giving up on getting the map back.

Flor sighed deeply. "We should take a break."

Bonnie rolled her eyes. "Again?"

They sat down, the sound of a small stream close to them. Bonnie decided to go over there and Sawyer followed her like always, leaving Flor alone in the small clearing.

Flor stared at the pair, they were close enough. Through the trees and green leaves she could see cascades of water as Bonnie splashed Sawyer. A joy in the dark that awaited them.

_Clang. _

Flor turned her head around. She slowly stood up. She couldn't see where the distant clanging came from. She left the map, her bag and the documents behind, a strange weight lifted off her shoulders as she walked away from the clearing, following the sound. She stepped carefully over the roots of a tree.

And she was suddenly face to face with a cow.

She blinked. The cow turned its head, its bell clinking as it mooed.

There was a cow.

In the middle of the jungle.

Someone whistled. And the cow turned around. Flor followed it warily, staying hidden behind the bushes. Her eyes widened when she saw that the cow was going towards a large building with a barnyard. Atop of the building was satellite dish, weathered from the nature.

It was a man who'd whistled at the cow. Flor couldn't see so clearly, but she believed he had an eye patch over one of his eyes. He was wearing a jumpsuit.

She needed to get Bonnie and Sawyer.

"So what do we do now?" Sawyer asked when the three of them were hidden behind the bushes, spying at the shed-like house.

"We go in," Flor said simply. "We were going in the right direction. This is where the explosions are. This is the station." She opened her backpack and picked out a document, showing it to them.

"The Flame," Sawyer read out loud. "Y'know this means the Others are here."

"I never thought otherwise." Flor bit her lip. "Though, I circled the area – he seems to be alone."

"All right." Bonnie stood up. "Let the professionals handle this." She took a step forward, but Sawyer grabbed her arm.

"What the hell are you doin'?"

Bonnie turned her gaze back to the station. "We know he's one of them. But he doesn't know that we know. Flor should stay behind, he'll recognize her otherwise. Cover for me?" she asked Sawyer.

He sighed but nodded. "Always, Blondie."

Bonnie carefully walked out from the bushes, holding her hands up as she approached the house. She saw a saddled horse, and she frowned. Sitting on the windowpane was a gray cat, narrow eyes that watched her as she walked. She swallowed.

A shot was fired. Bonnie fell on her knees, grunting in pain as she fell on her side.

"I didn't cross the line! You said we had a truce! This is my land!"

Bonnie raised a hand, groaning as she did so. She felt the bullet in her arm, oh god, the pain. "My name is Bonnie McQueen! Please, don't shoot! I'm not who you think I am."

The shots silenced. Bonnie could see a man with an eye patch stand by the open window.

"I'm a survivor of Oceanic 815. I was in a plane crash. I've been on this island for a very long time!"

"A plane crash?"

"I got no weapons. I swear!"

"Stay right there." He disappeared from view. Bonnie struggled up so she could see more. She heard a gun get cocked behind her.

"Drop the weapon!" Sawyer shouted as the man stepped out from the door. "Stop! Back up. Back up, now!"

The man put the rifle down by his feet. Sawyer picked it up, throwing him a glare before he was at Bonnie's side.

"You good?" He carefully put an arm under the shoulder that hadn't been hit.

"Just got shot." She grimaced. "I'm fine."

"You really did crash here?" The man asked.

Sawyer was trying to help her into the building. Bonnie protested, "No. Go first – make sure it's okay."

"Got no time," Sawyer responded. "Let's make this quick, Patchy. Who the hell are you?"

The man straightened his back. "My name is Mikhail Bakunin and I am the last remaining member of the DHARMA Initiative."

. . . .

Ava didn't learn to say 'mommy' until she was two years old.

It didn't bother Bonnie as much as people around her seemed to believe. Her husband – ex-husband, she reminded herself – had pursed his lips and showed all signs of being annoyed by it without actually saying that it bothered him. If he had, perhaps he wouldn't be her damn ex now.

She looked over to where her daughter was rolling her eyes. Her brother was playing a slow tune on the piano and she didn't seem happy with it at all. She scooted closer to Bonnie.

"Mom, this is why you have to be home more. So that daddy doesn't turn us all cultrual."

"Cultural," Bonnie corrected her. Hell, at one time in her life, around the time she got pregnant with the twins the thought of correcting her kids' grammar had scared her half to death. Well, more likely the thought of being old. But now it mostly felt natural.

"Whatever." Ava stood up and skipped across the room and flopped down beside Kyle. "Let's play something fun!" Bonnie heard her say cheerfully, and not it was her son's turn to roll his eyes.

Just as Bonnie picked up a magazine from the small coffee her phone started to ring.

"Bonnie?"

"That's usually to whom this number is directed to, yeah." She frowned. She recognized that voice.

"This is your father."

. . . .

"Where is…"

Sawyer gave Bonnie a warning glance towards Mikhail and Bonnie shut her mouth. He helped her over to the sofa where she sat down with relief.

"You got any experience with this?" Sawyer asked when he noticed Mikhail inspecting the gunshot wound in Bonnie's arm.

"I had experience with field medicine in the Soviet Army. Wait; let me get my medical kit. It's in my kitchen." Mikhail stood up.

"No." Sawyer stood up too. "Let me get it."

"It's on the top shelf."

Sawyer hurried away and Bonnie was left alone with Mikhail.

"So, how did you get here?" Bonnie asked a bit breathlessly.

"I almost don't know where to begin."

"Why don't you start with the Dharma Initiative?" she suggested.

"I grew up in Kiev and joined the Soviet Army. I was stationed at a listening post at Vladivostok. After the Cold War, after we lost the Cold War, my unit was decommissioned. I was dismissed from my life in the military. And after years of conducting unpleasant actions against our enemies." Bonnie raised an eyebrow at that. "I found myself wanting to do something good. So I replied to a newspaper advertisement."

Sawyer came back. Bonnie growled, "What took you so long?"

Mikhail opened the kit, taking out the alcohol wish he poured over the wound. Bonnie bit her lip so she wouldn't wince.

After Bonnie could breathe right again, she said, "I can imagine the advertisement: Would you like to come to a crazy magical island in the middle of nowhere? Then you are the right person for this job!"

Mikhail chuckled and shook his head. "No. It said: 'Would you like to save the world?' That's how I met them, the Initiative. They're very secretive, very rich, very smart."

"Kind of like Queen McQueen here then." Sawyer smiled.

"Who?"

Sawyer shook his head, the faintest trace of a real smile on his lips. "You got any food? I'm starving."

"Yes. It is in the kitchen. I believe you know the way." Mikhail didn't even look at Sawyer. when he left. Bonnie looked after him worriedly. But Sawyer simply smirked, raising an eyebrow at the gun he'd left behind at her side.

"So, what does this station do?" Bonnie looked back at Mikhail again.

"It communicates with the outside world, of course." Mikhail said it at the same time he took out the bullet and Bonnie screamed.

. . . .

The sounds of the children laughing drowned out when the door closed with a click. Bonnie sighed deeply and ran a finger through her curls. She had a hand on the desk, leaning.

"What's going on?" Parker asked, still by the door. He had a stern look that he always wore around her.

"I don't know where to start." Bonnie made a move as to sit down in the chair but then she straightened her back, glaring at him. "My father called me."

"Daniel?" asked Parker, eyes widening and he lost some of that strict posture. "But you haven't… You never…"

"Haven't talked for years. So he calls, babbles some incoherent things and hangs up." Bonnie looked away to hide the tears in her eyes, she wasn't going to show him she was affected by the fact that the first contact she and her father had had in years was with him spitting out drunken crap. She couldn't help but sniff. Parker was at her side in a moment.

"'S okay. Really." She faked a smile and he seemed revealed that he didn't have to comfort her in her breakdown. She sat down and he did the same. "So, I uh, I called Clive."

Parker's eyes narrowed. "Your stepbrother."

"Yeah. He wasn't _that_ drunk so it was easier to have a decent conversation. He told me that apparently… they're broke."

"That's not possible."

"My response exactly," Bonnie said. "His reply? Someone's conned them, somehow, someway. Seems like someone's been stealing out of the rich and famous' pockets for a very long time without them knowing. So after that little call with me hanging up 'cause he made some very obvious hints towards me giving them some aid – I checked my finances."

Parker raised his eyebrows. "And?"

"Looks like I'm gonna have to accept that role in Australia anyway."

. . . .

"There you are." Sawyer opened his backpack on the table when he saw the C-4 wired on the wall. The computer beside his backpack repeated with its robotic voice: "_Ready to play? Ready to play?"_

He hoped the man wouldn't follow him, as he hadn't exactly gone to the kitchen. He walked towards the wall but stopped abruptly when he noticed the large monitors on his right. He'd been so entranced by the explosives he hadn't noticed them. All of them were off, except for one.

It was replaying a short scene. Slowly he walked towards it, and he saw that it had been filmed from a security camera in a corner. There were three people in the room; he could see the top of their heads. One was sitting in a sofa. The two others were struggling about something.

In the corner of the screen, almost out of the shot someone fell. One of the ones who had been fighting rushed to the person's side.

Then he realized he was looking at surveillance footage of the hatch. The woman on the sofa was dead. The woman lying almost out of the screen was Rosalie. The person at her side was Flor. And the man with the gun was Michael.

Michael raised the gun at Flor.

The tape re-winded.

Sawyer looked away, and his gaze lay on a tape on the table. He looked from the tape to the C-4 and to the open door.

He put the tape labeled_ Jeremy Bluth _inside.

He stared at the monitor.

A scream sounded through the house. m

He was back in the living room in a manner of seconds. Mikhail had taken out the bullet and was not patching her up.

"There." Mikhail smiled, it wasn't exactly pleasant.

Bonnie smiled back. "Thanks."

Then she punched him. She reached for the gun, swinging it at him again but Mikhail realized what was going on and grabbed her arm. Bonnie winced.

Sawyer clocked him over the head with the gun, and he fell down to the ground, brining Bonnie with him. Bonnie kicked him in the gut. He grimaced, scrabbled with his hands for a hold on her but she crawled out of his way. Sawyer finally knocked the man out with another blow to the head.

"Remind me why we didn't do this sooner?" Sawyer asked her, rolling Mikhail's head around to see his closed eyes. Yeah, he was out all right.

Bonnie looked up at him, holding her arm, grimacing. "Because he isn't alone."

"And how do you know that?"

Sawyer helped Bonnie up on her feet. "I pay attention to details. The horse outside is saddled to someone much smaller than him. Look at the glasses on the table – one is half-full. And then there are the shoes at the door… I think Mikhail's feet are bigger than those small boots. We need to get out of here."

Sawyer nodded. "All right, Sherlock. Let me get the backpack and C-4. You get the hell away from here."

"C-4?" Bonnie raised an eyebrow. "Okay."

Sawyer left for the other room. His eyes scanned everything around him, the monitors, the computer. There were so many other things they could bring if they had the time.

But they didn't.

His thoughts went instead to the footage he'd seen, as he carefully removed the C-4 and put it inside his backpack.

Sawyer stopped zipping the backpack up, feeling someone's gaze on him. He hesitated.

And he felt the edge of a rifle against his back. "I'd be quiet if I were you," said the voice behind him. It was a woman's.

"If I were you, sweetheart, I'd be putting the weapon away," he replied, his voice low.

"Why would I do that?"

He looked up at the black screens of the monitors, seeing distorted, faded form of a young woman with dark skin and dark hair. And he could just make out the shape of someone else behind her. He smirked.

"Because my girlfriend is gonna blow your brains out if you don't do just that."

"Sure." The sarcastic tone in her voice told him that she clearly didn't believe a word he was saying.

"Very sure," said Bonnie and made her presence known. Her gun was raised and pointed straight at the young woman. "And I'm not your girlfriend," she said to Sawyer who just smirked.

Sawyer turned around, hands still raised because the rifle was still aimed at his direction.

"Now drop your weapon, girl. Or this story's gonna end just like he said," Bonnie continued.

"You really want to bet on who's going tofire first?" The woman showed no signs of fear. Her almost black almond-shaped eyes practically shined at the invitation of a fight. "Your finesse this far hasn't been on top. You're both sloppy. Walking in here expecting us to not defend ourselves. Like we're like _you_."

"We're _nothing_ like you." It was Flor's voice.

"Joy. Here comes the cavalry." Sawyer looked at Flor, who walked quickly up to the woman and pressed the end of a rifle into her skull.

"I say the odds are pretty much in our favor," said Bonnie cheerfully.

The woman let go of her rifle, and Sawyer was quick to take it up himself. "What the hell are you doing here?" he hissed to Flor.

"I was chasing butterflies and one of them went in here," she replied completely seriously, staring at the woman with something dark in her eyes.

"Who's watching Mikhail?" Bonnie suddenly asked.

. . . .

Ava accepted the news with ease. She flicked her hair in a very Bonnie-like way but of course, she said later, she was sad, just like she was sad when dad got to work too. But she knew he would always come back.

Kyle was mostly silent. Bonnie was worried about him. His sister took up so much air and it was difficult for him to take place with her around.

Bonnie repeatedly checked her cell to see if her father had called again. He hadn't.

Parker didn't say anything of what he thought about it.

Bonnie sat down in front of the laptop. She was going to do some research.

Just as she'd gotten a name, _Hugo Reyes_, Kyle came into the room. She closed the laptop. And the name was forgotten.

"Don't go, Mom," Kyle whispered. "Please, don't go."

While Ava was free and wild, Kyle was the opposite, he was closed in and quiet. And Bonnie sometimes thought she was a bit selfish for hoping he would stay clingy to her forever.

But he never cried when she left. Now tears were running down his face and she hugged him closely. "Oh, honey." She kissed the top of his head. "I know it's hard. But we're gonna speak to each other every day and you got these laptops so –"

"_No_," he protested. "No. We're not."

"I always talk to you every day."

"This time's different," he mumbled.

Bonnie still left.

. . . .

"LET THAT GO!" Sawyer shouted.

Mikhail turned around. He had only managed to flee outside. He had a walkie-talkie in his right hand and a smug look on his face, which only disappeared at the sight of the young woman Flor was holding her gun at. His eyes flickered from her to Flor.

"Mary Jane?" he uttered, revealing the woman's name, but as he turned his eyes to Flor he went from surprise to something very close to irritation.

Flor knew he recognized her from before. The half-drugged girl they'd brought to his home. She remembered now. This was where they took her before, made her see her son with Byron and his new woman.

Maybe the man hated her too like all the rest of his people did. Maybe he wanted to take their weapons and use it against her. At that thought, she moved even closer to the young woman, Mary Jane. She would make sure she couldn't escape. But she wasn't sure if she could really shoot her if they had to.

"You will have to kill me before I give you the file!"

"What file?" Sawyer sneered. "But thanks for letting us know that we need it."

Mikhail began, "I –"

Three shots. And there were three bullet holes in Mikhail's chest.

Flor was too shocked to react. And in one second a punch was aimed at her head. She lost control of the gun and she hit the wall hard, still standing on her legs as she watched the young woman darted to the jungle.

"We need to get her!" They had to catch her before it was too late. All she suddenly could think about was what would happen if they didn't. If she got back to her people and told them about them – Flor thought about the surveillance cameras. She was sure she'd cut off the right cables when circling around, but she wasn't one hundred percent sure. It would destroy everything. And Sean –

She jumped at the sound of another shot ringing out. A woman's cream. But it wasn't her, Sawyer or Bonnie who'd fired.

Out of the trees came John Locke with a gun in his hand. "Need some help over here!" he shouted.

Flor, Bonnie and Sawyer hurried over to him.

. . . .

"You seem to have a lot on your mind." Savannah threw her a look between her dark mascara heavy lashes.

Bonnie sighed deeply, bonding with her co-actors could be devastatingly boring or devastatingly funny and this was something more leaning towards utterly devastatingly boring. It was the same every time on a new set.

Savannah had a hard time looking anyone in the eye for more than three seconds, a jittery, twitchy trait her own character had.

"Yes. I'm…" Bonnie considered for a moment telling her the truth, but only for a moment. She knew what would happen if it became widely known that money had been taken, and that it was so much more than simple theft. "I just miss my children."

"Ooh, right. Um, twins, yeah? Boy and a girl? I don't have any kids of my own. Don't have the time. But I have young cousins – well, cousin. Don't talk to her so much actually." Her eyes went to the mirror; the only pair of eyes she seemed comfortable to meet was her own green.

Bonnie tried her hardest not to roll her eyes. "Yeah, Kyle and Ava." She smiled. "They're…" Her voice trailed off, as she caught someone staring at her by the bar. She was used to have people stare at her of course. It was a fact that came with being famous. But the guy looked good. And he was probably a lot better company than Savannah was, who hadn't even noticed that she'd stopped talking.

She excused herself to Savannah, who barely seemed to notice, too absorbed in the world of her shiny cell phone.

"Hello." Bonnie slid down on the stool beside the man.

His eyes widened, Bonnie's smile grew wider. So he did know how she was, at least at the way he was staring at her. Bonnie's smile didn't falter; she was pretty quick on figuring guys out and what they were after, you had to. This guy's fingers were tapping on the watch on his wrist out of sync with the music, he had a dark blue suit that Bonnie knew from sitting across the room was expensive, but not enough to draw attention to it.

The man suddenly seemed to remember himself, and hastily said, "Hello, I'm Simon, uh, Simon Bailey."

Bonnie smiled to encourage him.

"And… I'm… late." He stood up quickly. "Really late. Uh, nice talking to you, Bonnie." He rushed off before she could say anything.

He was really weird.

When she walked back to Savannah she realized that she hadn't told him her name, but many people knew who she was, she reminded herself. The feeling that something as quite not right was from paranoia, not from reality.

. . . .

"I'll go get the C-4, then," Locke said after they'd caught him up about it all. He didn't even argue when Bonnie decided to patch the Other girl up, she was luckily passed out as Bonnie took out the bullet. Sawyer didn't ask him about the camp, he knew Locke would tell them about it later when there was time for it.

He walked outside, the rifle on his back. The sun was going down, a red glow in the horizon. He could hear the sounds of the insects, the rustle of leaves. 'It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity –'

"'It was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven –'"

"What is that?" Flor asked him without turning around. Her dark hair fell long around her shoulders, a shine in it from the darkening sun.

"It's Charles Dickens," Sawyer told her.

Flor stood up and wiped the sweat off her brow. "I know. Why did you say it?"

"You know why." Sawyer looked down at the newly dug grave, and the body lying beside it. Mikhail's eyes were open. Flor leaned down again to close them.

She lowered her head. But Sawyer knew she wasn't crying. It was more in desperation, frustration – despair.

"Locke's collecting the explosives. I'm gonna look for that file he mentioned later and Bonnie's trying to fix that Other girl –"

"You told him?" She still wouldn't look at him.

Sawyer nodded. "Yeah. I did."

"Why?" Flor didn't sound mad, just resigned at the fact that no one listened to her.

"Because with Daniel Boone on our side we might all come out alive."

Flor stood up and turned around to face him. She took a sharp intake of air and shook her head. "This is too much. Sawyer, when we planned this we didn't count on actually succeeding and now with Bonnie and Locke here… We can't all do this." Her voice broke.

"We have to." Sawyer lowered his head. "I – I saw somethin' in there."

"What?" she asked tiredly.

Sawyer sighed. "I saw some footage – of Rosalie dying. And in that angle – it looked like you and Michael were struggling. But then – it looked like you killed her in cold blood."

"No news then," Flor answered coldly, but he could see her eyes tearing up.

He raised his eyebrows. "It's all about the point of view, isn't it?"

Flor frowned at that. And Sawyer walked away to let her to think about his words.

. .

Flor and Locke were engaged in a battle of stares, it appeared at least to be the case to Bonnie. They had moved away deeper into the valley after leaving the Flame and none of them had gotten any sleep. Above them the moon was hidden by the branches and the only source of light in the darkness came from the flashlight.

"Correct me if I'm wrong. But if I didn't know better I would say you weren't happy to see me." Locke broke the silence and Sawyer snorted at his words.

Flor looked like she was close to stomp her feet in childish fury. "Sawyer," she gritted out between her teeth. "A word?"

She turned her back sharply to them and began to walk away. Sawyer rolled his eyes but followed her. "Darling, if you wanted me alone with you…"

Bonnie crossed her arms; the gun was still in her hand. "How'd you find us?" she asked Locke.

"I followed your trail the best I could. And with luck, I happened to stumble upon you."

Bonnie frowned. "Luck?"

Locke tilted his head to the side. "Why are you all so suspicious of me?"

Bonnie didn't have an answer to that. But she didn't need to. The young woman lying on one of their blankets on the ground groaned. Her eyes fluttered open but close when Locke turned the flashlight at her face.

Bonnie bent down by her side. "Can you hear me?"

The girl swore so Bonnie took that as a yes. "Mary Jane, yes, I know your name."

She clenched her teeth together. Bonnie grabbed her jaw. "Who are you?"

"Bonnie," Locke said warningly.

Bonnie looked up at him. "These are the people who took them." She turned her gaze down and looked directly in the woman's hateful stare. "What are you? Why are you doing this?"

She didn't answer.

"_What are you_ –"

"Easy there, Princess. Or you might break your voice." Sawyer returned, Flor at his side.

"Why's she even with us? Aren't we gonna do something about her?" Bonnie nodded at the young woman.

"What do you suggest we do?" Locke asked in his calm voice.

Bonnie waved with the gun. The girl remained silence. Flor gasped. Locke stared. Sawyer rolled his eyes again once more.

"No, you won't."

"Why not? She's a kidnapping murdering Other."

"'Cause we need the kidnapping murdering Other unless you and Crocodile Locke wanna stay behind."

"We got a plan?" Bonnie asked in surprise.

"Hell yes we got a plan. First we gotta get some sleep. Spacy, you explain to 'em." To prove his point about sleeping, Sawyer grabbed a blanket and walked away from them.

The young woman on the ground was completely silent, her eyes were closed, but Bonnie was still pointing the gun at her. Flor threw a glance her way.

"Is the plan bloody?" Bonnie asked suddenly.

"Uh, um, maybe?" Flor replied, fingering on her hair. "Uh, it depends. Who is she, anyway?"

"I thought maybe you would know," Locke said. "And her name is Mary Jane, I believe."

Flor shook her head. "Haven't met her. But as Sawyer said she's gonna be useful. I think. Um…" She looked at Locke. "We are going to the Others –"

"– Because you're going to rescue those who've been taken. It's a very obvious fact. Now, tell me your plan."

Flor took a deep breath. "All right. You see, when Sawyer and I planned this as best as we could, it was just supposed to be the both of us. Look at his." Locke turned the flashlight to the map Flor held. "These are wiring leading to something that seems like a small community, here." She pointed. "Our guess is that that's where they live. There's even a dock there. There's something surrounding it, some sort of fence, we aren't really sure, but it's powered which makes us think some bad things are bound to happen if you walk between them. So we were gonna take another route."

Bonnie raised her eyebrows. "What route? It looks like that fence goes around the whole thing. And should we really speak of this with her here?" She nodded at the maybe-pretending-to-be-sleeping Other.

"I'm getting to it," Flor retorted. "There are other ways in. Ways that aren't on this map. I'll – I'll tell you more later. How do you think the Others can move so quickly over the island? They got roads. Tunnels, underground. And Sawyer and I are gonna get in that way."

"What about us?" Locke asked.

"You're going to find out what the fence is. And before you walk between these… pylon-things. You're gonna throw _her _in the way."

Bonnie still had the quizzical look on her face. "And if she comes out fine?"

Flor looked down. "Sawyer said that you should take… care of her if that happens. And if she doesn't – then you'll find some other way around it. If you don't like it you can go back. Really, I suggest you do. I know why you're looking at me like that – like I'm crazy – and that's because this plan is. We're not counting on coming out of this in one piece, we're only hoping we can at least get to see Eva and get to know she's okay."

"I'm going with you," said Bonnie.

"I don't have anywhere else to be," said Locke.

"Okay." Flor nodded softly. She suddenly turned to look at the woman. "I don't suppose you can tell us whether or not the tunnels are guarded?"

The woman had her eyes closed.

"Or what'll happen if you cross the fence?"

Mary Jane slightly smiled.

. . . .

Bonnie kept calling him, even after she'd rushed to the airport after hearing about the car accident. It was to keep her from screaming to everyone to get the bloody plane ready to they could leave, she didn't want to be kicked off. It would take even longer to get back to the States that way.

"I never like not finding out the whole truth," she said, eyes flickering over all the people waiting at the gate. She was standing behind a blonde pregnant lady (Australian, according to the accent, and well, it made sense since they were in Australia) and Bonnie really hoped she wouldn't have the baby right there. "That there are still pieces to the puzzle I don't know."

"_You got time figuring it out_." Parker didn't sound as upset as she. Bonnie felt her stomach turn, but she forced herself not to ask any more questions about how her daughter was. Another 'I don't know' and she would break down.

"There's just this feeling that I won't." Bonnie sighed. "I think this is a lot bigger than I thought…" She didn't know how to phrase it, "…something more than just theft. And it's…"

She looked over the crowd of people, had they started to move? No. Just her wishing, then. She looked over to where a black, plump woman was instructing her young, taller daughter on how important it was to not lose her passport.

"_Not important_."

"What?" Bonnie snapped back to reality. She shook a blonde strand of hair out of her face, wondering if she'd heard right. "How can you say that?"

"_Before you start to act like you're in an Agatha Christie story, Bonnie – think. Think of what you're making up, think of what it means if you're right. Let go. It doesn't matter anymore. What matters is that your daughter is in the hospital right now. That matters_."

"I know. Okay, I know!" Bonnie wiped away a tear with her hand that'd threatened to fall. She couldn't help but sound choked up though, and Parker had noticed it.

"_I didn't mean that you didn't care _–"

She gazed over to the mother and daughter she'd watched earlier, another woman and a gruff-looking man who looked like he was bound to break a girl's heart had joined them.

"Yeah, you did." They were both silent for a moment. Bonnie looked down, sniffing. "I'll see you when I get back to L.A."

She shut the phone, and got ready to board the plane. As she stood in line, not even bothering to be annoyed at not being in first class, she thought of her daughter Ava, and Parker and how he was right. She had to let go.

. . . .

Flor could barely sleep. It felt like she'd just closed her eyes when she opened them again. She could hear Sawyer snore. And Bonnie's light breathing. She rubbed her eyes and sat up quietly.

"Good morning."

She blinked at Locke who was holding guard. She looked at their prisoner who'd they'd tied to the tree, she seemed to be sleeping.

Flor swallowed. "Yeah, um, good morning."

Locke handed her a water bottle and a papaya. She gratefully accepted them. She drank a little before she put it down on the ground.

"Flor," Locke said, "do you mind me asking you what happened to you with the Others?"

Flor's eyes flickered to look at anything but him. "I thought Sawyer told everyone –"

"He told everybody how you escaped. He didn't tell us what happened to you."

"My escape, it was a miracle," Flor mumbled absently. Louder she said, "Why do you wanna know?"

Locke sliced a piece with his knife of the mango, "If you don't want to tell me. You don't have to."

Flor sighed. She was wringing her hands, looking away, closing her eyes. She would give in; she would want to explain herself one more time, even though it seemed that the more she tried to fight the more she would break. She opened her eyes, just a little blue in all the gray.

"They were gonna kill me. That's… that's why they took me. That's why they took me from the start. They believed I would do something. I don't know what. Something terrible, I guess, to make them want to kill me so badly. And – and they hated me, you know. They weren't just suspicious of me. They downright hated me. They blamed me for everything. It was so confusing. I don't know what to make of it. One of them, Juliet she showed me this tape – and I don't know. I don't know _why_. So they were gonna kill me. They took me to this room, bag over my head, gun pressed against my temple. It was going to be over."

"But the woman Janna saved you," Locke finished for her.

Flor was shaking. "I don't think she did."

Bonnie, Sawyer and the woman were still sleeping. Locke just looked calm; while Flor was trying her hardest to recollect the pieces and fears she'd spilled out.

"You don't look at me the way the others do," Flor said accusingly, breaking the silence.

Locke turned his head to look at her. "What way would that be?"

"Like you hate me." Flor looked down at her hands. They weren't soft anymore like they used to be one time. They were lined with stories. "Like you want me dead," she said in the same monotone voice. With a deep breath like she was afraid to say it she continued, "Just like this island does."

Locke slowly put the knife in its holster slowly. "Why do you think that?"

Flor glanced up, looking briefly at him through her hair. "I don't. But I'm starting to. Almost. I don't know why I said it. I should…" She made a movement, as to leave. But Locke raised a hand and she stilled.

"You said before that you surviving – that it was a miracle. But later that it was an insane woman who saved you. Coincidences, unlikely series of events leading up to that moment – that moment when she barged into that room – and as you said, saved you from a certain death."

"Coincidence," Flor repeated softly.

"Coincidences. There is a young man back at our camp. He said he came on a freighter – the same freighter that woman, Janna, was from. Some didn't believe him. So they did nothing about him. They let him watch them from afar. They let him live beside them, not with. This young man asks lots of questions but there is only one answer he seeks."

Flor's eyes narrowed as she listened.

"It's the answer to where you are, Flor."

"Who is he?" Flor asked curiously.

"He says his name is Frederic Phelps."

Flor's eyes widened. Her right hand closed. She held her breath.

"Would it be coincidence or fate he turned out to be who he really says he is? Maybe –" and Locke smiled eagerly, "– it's neither. Maybe it's the island." He raised a finger, still smiling when he told her, "I've looked into the eye of the island. And what I saw was beautiful."

Flor shook her head slightly, meeting his gaze. "All I've seen is pain, John. Pain and death."

Locke continued to smile when he stood up. "That is because you still have your eyes closed, Flor."

_BANG! _Flor fell on her hands in shock. The ground almost seemed to move. She could smell smoke – burning. And just as she blinked she saw glimpses of fire, red, orange – ash.

"What the hell?" Sawyer shouted, all awake now.

"It came from the place of the station," Bonnie said, eyes wide and scared of the shock.

"I guess they didn't need it anymore," Locke said calm as ever.

. .

They parted ways. Flor and Locke exchanged one last looked of something close to understanding. Bonnie kissed Sawyer long and promising and he smirked at her until she snapped at him.

Flor didn't look back. But Sawyer did as they walked away. He looked at Bonnie, at Locke, but mostly at the young woman whose name he didn't know.

"Let's do this thing," he muttered to Flor.

. .

**Author's Notes:** Do you got holidays now? I do. Somehow I seem to be just as busy as when I was still in school, ah, life. I was over at my aunt's and couldn't update because of the OLDEST WORD EVER and I was very annoyed by that.

I dare to say I got the best reviewers ever. Thank you all so much! I get really encouraged when I hear you're eagerly waiting for an update, it cheers me up, even though I feel bad for not being able to update at times. I hope I'll be able to get the next chapter up quickly, no promises as the documents are being evil and messed up.

Anyway, here's a little survey, you don't need to answer every question.

**What's your favorite pairing in this story and why?: **

**What kind of pairing would you like to see and why?: **

**Who is your favorite OC (other than yours) and why?:**

**Who's your least favorite OC and why?:**

**Do you think the chapters have improved or gotten worse since the beginning?:**

**Which is your favorite chapter and why?**

**Which is your least favorite chapter and why?**

**Which flashback story do you like the most?**

**Which flashback story don't you like?**

**Which mystery do you want to be resolved the most?: (Examples: Walt, Brian's freaky healing, Boone's freaky healing, who was on the tape Flor saw etc.)**

Thank you all so much!


	47. Spirit

_A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
_With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,  
Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
_Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would control,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
For that bright hope at last  
And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

. .

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 39, Spirit**

. .

Before the phrases: "I give you my word" "I swear on my mother's grave" had a meaning. Breaking such a promise would be dishonorable (and without honor you were nothing) and therefore when someone said those things – they could be trusted. Of course there have always been people that have lied. But they were always thought of less. Now promises are made to be broken. And giving one's word means nothing. Swearing on one's mother's grave doesn't mean anything since most people simply doesn't have dead mums or they simply don't care. You don't have to be a bad person to lie. It's simply in our nature.

There are few people who hold onto the sacredness – the little left – of promises. And some say they're noble people. But maybe they're not noble at all. What if their entire lives are in such chaos that they're trying to make one thing a constant?

We all need constants. But choosing something so changeable to be one's must be a sign of mental affliction.

. .

She blinked. Her head was heavy, pounding. She blinked again and she was met by the sight of a ravine. She suddenly realized that the reason her head was pounding was because she was hanging upside-down.

She took one second to panic before she began to struggle. She tried to raise her head but it had gone too long. Her hand desperately tried to reach the parachute so she could pull it off but it was out of reach, stuck in the branches above her. She caught a glimpse of the too-bright sky and groaned in despair.

Her hands were shaking too much for her to accomplish anything. She had to get down. She made one last desperate attempt to pull it off but it didn't work.

Then the branch above her creaked worryingly.

"_Nee_," she whispered.

The branch split in the middle. She covered her face. There was no time to even think before there was water all around her. Before she was too trapped inside the tangle of branches, clothes, pulling her down in the whirlwind. She opened her eyes, trying to see through the rush around her. Her lungs were screaming. Her eyes were burning. She tried to get up. Because if she didn't she would die here. Now.

With one last effort she found the knife stuck in her pocket. But she couldn't cut through water. It was all too green. She was sinking too fast.

She closed her eyes.

She was trying to think of something that meant something in her last thoughts. But all she could feel and hear was the water rushing in her ears and her lungs screaming for oxygen and the pain and the panic and –

She gasped, coughing up water from her mouth and her head was hurting more than it had ever done before and she couldn't move but she _could _breathe. Her eyes fluttered as she was trying to keep them open but was too tired to do so. Someone was speaking to her. And she coughed again, chest aching. She pulled in another rattled breath and opened her eyes.

"Keep still, Milou." Miles Straume's face sharpened and she could see that water was dripping from his hair and clothes. Above him the trees swayed slightly in the wind.

"Wh…" was all Milou Van Dyck could manage to get out. Before she looked down and saw the red on her vest. She groaned and let her head fall down on the ground again.

She passed out before he could tell her everything was going to be okay.

. .

"How…"

"Through my wits and brains," Miles responded when he put her down in the makeshift bed. He hit his head in the low wall and winced. "I gotta see if there's a medical kit or something around here."

He wasn't ready to tell her how he'd found the place. She wouldn't believe him. It would just lead to unnecessary arguing and he didn't need that right now.

There was a roof over her head. Milou closed her eyes. She wondered where they were. She would ask him. Soon.

Miles, meanwhile Milou was trying to keep in touch with what was dream and reality, hadn't found anything resembling a medical kit. But he'd found something he hopes was clean bandages.

He hurried over to where Milou was mumbling. He touched her forehead. Damn, she had a fever. Great. He could add another thing to the list of what was just absolutely freaking brilliant about the island.

"I'm no doctor." Miles carefully undid the straps of clothing he'd wrapped around Milou's stomach. Ouch. Her wound did not look pretty. He wondered if it was infected. "But I think you're gonna… well, I wouldn't say be okay since that's pretty obvious you never will. But in surviving you got a pretty good chance."

"Waar is Ines?" Milou mumbled. He could see her eyes moving rapidly behind the closed eyelids.

"What?"

Milou continued to mumble incoherently, and he wandered over to where whoever had lived in the bunker had built a table. There were notes and papers scattered over it but Miles pushed those aside. He found a bowl with what looked like water in it. Would he dare to give it to Milou? He carefully took a sip before he spit it all out. "Disgusting."

He went back to exploring the small place to find anything of use. He found a blanket, which he really didn't think was clean or anything but Milou was shaking and he couldn't remember if it was good to have warmth or not.

He put a hand to his forehead and took a deep breath. "Damn it, Milou. Tell me what to do!"

"Drowned. W-warmth."

Miles hadn't expected her to hear him, but apparently she had.

He put the blanket over her body, and she closed her eyes again. "H-How did you f-find…"

"I followed the trail of dead people."

Milou's eyes fluttered. "Magic d-doesn't e-exist."

"There's no magic in what I'm doing. I need to get some food, so – uh, don't die on me, okay?"

"Okay."

. .

It took three days before Milou was coherent again.

"Why did you bring me to this… place?" Was the first thing she said when he woke up in the morning. She was sitting up in the bed, a hand over the bandage on her stomach, glaring at him.

"'Cause I thought it was better than lying in a pool of mud in the jungle." Miles got up to get a mango form the small pile he'd gathered the other day. "Crazy me."

"This could be one of theirs," Milou told him seriously.

Miles handed her a bowl. She crinkled her nose when she looked down at the mix in it.

"It's mashed mangoes and papayas."

Milou accepted it. "Thank you."

"And this isn't one of 'theirs.' This place has been abandoned for a long time. It belonged to a chick named Rousseau. She was French, I think. She enjoyed blowing things… animals… people… up."

"How do you know of this?"

Miles smiled and sat down in a chair. "You know how. Aaand, I don't think you should be standing up just yet. Since you almost drowned. And since that branch got stuck inside your stomach."

"You are lying."

"No I'm not."

"If that was the case I'd not be awake right now."

"Sure. Pretend all you want." Miles went back to eating his mango.

"Have you made any contact with the rest of the team?"

Miles shook his head. "Our sat phone's working just fine. But none of the others are showin' up."

"Let me see." Milou said it in a tone that could not be argued with. Miles walked over to her with a sigh and sat down at the side of her bed. Milou grabbed the satellite phone with one hand; with the other she pulled her blonde hair back so she could have a better look.

Miles watched her with a raise of his eyebrow but didn't say anything.

"Perhaps they are outside the radius."

"Perhaps," replied Miles.

"What about Janna and Naomi?" Milou kept her eyes on the phone. "Have you seen anyone else?"

"If I'd seen anybody else they would have been here listening to you instead of me."

Milou made an irritated noise but didn't say anything. "Have you tried to contact the freighter? Captain Gault?"

"Of course I have. They're not answering."

"Why not?"

"Because they're too busy dancing and having a pool party. I don't know, Milou. We can't use it to contact anything from outside the island."

"Maybe you used it wrong."

Miles rolled his eyes and stood up again, hitting his head on the low roof again.

. .

_Blood rushing. Waterfalls. Drop drop drop. Hearts beating. Hearts stopping. Petals falling down all red._

Janna's eyes fluttered open and she gathered herself for the attack. But there was none. She was lying alone there in the jungle with broken branches and leaves scattered over her like she was the earth itself.

Florence Bluth was gone.

She laid there still as hot fire raged through her chest. She didn't have any weapons on her. Bluth was gone. She was alone in nowhere land. Bluth was missing.

She'd made the promise to help her if she could. But the promise she'd made could be interpreted in many ways.

For now, keeping Florence Bluth alive might be to stay away from her.

A storm was coming.

. .

"Our orders are to –"

"YOU ALMOST DROWNED!"

They both glared at each other, until Miles sighed and threw his hands up in the air. "You know what? I don't care. Go and kill yourself if that's what you wanna do. I'm done."

He crossed his arms and looked at her expectantly. Milou took one careful step, and another one. She raised her head to tell him something – she didn't gloat but it felt like a moment to do so – when a sharp pain stabbed her like a knife. She bent over, her hands trailing after something to hold onto that wasn't there. Miles was at her side in a second.

He helped her back to the makeshift bed. She slowly lowered her head and closed her eyes.

"I told you –"

"Don't. I will just rest, for a minute."

"Sure." Miles chuckled. "I will go outside. See if I can get reception on this thing."

Milou mumbled from the bed, "It will not work."

Miles climbed up the ladder. "Can't blame a guy for trying."

As soon as Miles stuck his head out a branch came flying his way. He ducked. But it was too late. He went falling down the ladder, hitting his head hard on the floor.

The next five minutes was spent by Milou lecturing him about how he had to be careful because one of them had to go out in the storm to get fruit and since she was – and then she dissolved into speaking in Dutch and Miles was not up for trying to find a lexicon or something so he swallowed the little pride he had left and went back into the storm.

The underground shelter easily blended into the ground. But Miles knew he would easily find it if he survived through the tons of rains falling down on him of course. His head ached, naturally because of the many people who'd died on the land around him. But he pushed it away; it was easier, when they had been gone for a long time.

The dead.

He knew the smart thing to do was do go back underground safe from – oh, crap falling trees – and hide there until the storm was over, but that meant getting stuck with Milou holier-than-holy Van Dyck for god knows how long and he was not up for that.

Deadly lightning bolts had never seemed better.

Even though there was possibly no way that he would get any food in this weather, he could at least try to see if he could get any sort of reception on his satellite phone, Milou's had been broken in her fall.

He gazed down on the screen, but it was simply a red light glowing into his eyes. Nothing.

The sky thundered and he re-considered his decision to go out in the storm. He turned around. And found that every tree looked exactly the same.

He swallowed.

He turned around again.

He tried to listen.

But there was no way to determine which was he'd come from. He had noticed a weirdly shaped rock – perhaps if he could find it again he would find his way back to Milou. Or he could get hit by lightning and die.

He needed to concentrate. He closed his eyes. He –

A loud bang, the ground rocked. He looked at his side where a frail tree laid.

No time to think, just time to run like hell.

Until, you know, stopped and fell on your back, of course.

The back of his head hit the ground hard, teeth clashing together. He groaned, looking up in a daze and saw an arm, the edges of a face just out of view.

"Miles?" Oh, _God_. How he hated that cold voice.

"Janna?" he groaned. "Thanks for knocking me to the ground."

. .

After Milou had managed to get the most part of Janna's story out, there were a few things that were clear. Naomi was lost. And their priority now had to be to get to the survivors of Oceanic 815's camp.

Also, the 815-ers couldn't be trusted.

"We _have _to." Milou settled the faint argument whether or not she would manage to trek through the jungle, in the aftermath of a storm.

Miles kind of admired her sometimes (which he would deny until his dying day that he thought that.)

Janna brought Milou her crutch (helping-me-walk-stick was too long and it sounded really weird when Milou said it), Miles gathered the little fruit (he could find something dead anyway), Janna muttered to herself and increased her chances of killing all of them in three seconds (108% chance now), and they were on their way.

. .

Miles hated jungles. He especially hated jungles with _polar bears_ running around in it.

. .

Miles swore that Janna had stared at him for five minutes straight without blinking.

They were still not able to contact the freighter. Janna had a theory. Miles stopped listening when she reached the: 'It won't work.'

. .

"We're here."

Milou once again showed her (sort of) impressive skills from the military when she squinted through the trees. Without speaking, she signaled for Janna to circle around. She and Miles took a route away from the small glints of people and distant voices that could've just been the wind if he didn't know it was there.

Milou put her other hand on his arm, and she nodded towards a thin, almost invisible thread on the ground – leading to a trap. Miles wasn't able to investigate it further as Milou, while limping, led him further through the trees still standing.

Milou let him go when they were close to the beach. He could see the waves rolling in on the shore. There was a single person out there on the sand, walking towards them in a fast pace, pushing his glasses further up on his nose.

"Phelps," he said with a slight smirk when they walked out from the jungle. Frederic Phelps stopped abruptly in his tracks. At his side, Milou smiled, but she was still tense. She gazed over at the camp where no one had yet noticed their arrival.

Fred just stared at them. He had always been a bit weird.

"So," Miles tried to make him come alive by waving his hand in front of his face, "you're not gonna introduce us to your friends?"

"Of course not," Milou snapped. "Let's go. Quickly."

Miles didn't really know what she was planning, but he helped her drag the still too-stunned-to-speak Fred into the jungle again.

Janna met up with them when they were once again at a safe distance from the camp, but still close enough to see it.

"They have weapons," she informed them. "Their camp is mostly ruined but they're re-building it. They're all running around like chickens without heads. But I believe…" She glanced at Fred. "He will have more to say about this."

"Me?" Fred finally squeaked. "What about you? Where've you been? Have you any idea what I've been through!"

Miles was too busy digging through Fred's backpack for food to pretend to pity him.

"First this girl with one blue eye and one green eye took my satellite phone and left and she was possibly in league with those Others and then they locked me in the smallest cage ever and then they refuse to believe me when I say I'm here to rescue them and they all hate me and let me stay in some sort of solitary confinement and then people get shot and some people are in a cave and everything falls down and everyone here is absolutely mad. Absolutely mad, I tell you! And no one won't ever tell me what the hell happened to Flor –"

"Phelps. Stop." Milou glared at him. "We are here now. And we have our orders. So explain to us if these people are a danger to us or not."

"We need some proof. If we could contact the freighter… But we don't have a satellite phone…"

"Actually," said Miles, happily taking a bite of the mango, "we do."

. .

"And that is how we ended up here," Milou finished the story with the same monotone voice she'd used from the beginning.

Andrea and Desmond exchanged a look.

"Tell us about Penelope Widmore."

. .

The survivors exchanged curious, worried looks after the new arrivals from the freighter, Milou Van Dyck, Miles Straume and Jóhanna Stefándóttir. Some of them felt guilt over the way they'd treated Frederic Phelps, who now apparently had been speaking the truth.

Andrea kept the same expression when Milou explained that it was Widmore who sent them there. And that they were all going to be saved. But first they had to get their satellite phone working; earning muttering amongst the survivors ("It's always broken!" "It'll just get stolen again." "_Brilliant_.")

"Andy?" asked Libby carefully, in a low voice so the others couldn't hear. It was in these moments that the people from the other side of the island turned to her.

Andrea swallowed and avoided all of their gazes. "I need to go and check up on Kim."

"Andrea," said Bernard pleadingly when Andrea turned around to walk away.

"If you want to trust them, then that's okay. But I'm not going to. I'm going to concentrate on saving those I can."

"You are s-speaking the truth, aren't you?" Fox asked them.

There was something weird in the way Janna stared at him at that. Milou moved so she was between Fox and her. "Of course," she replied calmly. Even though she was irritated by the way they were all acting, so intent on not believing them.

. .

"Something is blocking the signal. It's not broken. But something else is transmitting from here," Milou told Fox, Fred, Desmond, Margo and Zidler later, on the outskirts of the camp where they wouldn't be disturbed.

Margo and Zidler exchanged a look. "Erm…" Zidler began.

"Uh…" Margo continued.

Milou stared at them. Fred was trying a more friendly approach, "What?"

Zidler cleared his throat. "Well, you see. A long, long time ago –"

"At the beginning of times –" Margo continued.

"A group of strangers, us, crashed on this island –"

"– And were completely clueless that there were no escape from the soulless place."

"So they began upon a journey –"

"– Over dangerous rivers and creatures like polar bears –"

"_Vicious_ polar bears. So these brave fellows, well, two of them were brave and good-looking at least, climbed up this mountain."

"And at the top of this mountain they tried to contact the outside world."

"Using this, uh…"

"Transmitter…"

"Transceiver…"

"…Thing."

"When they suddenly heard an eerie message."

"It was in a very foreign language."

"French."

"And it said –"

"– They're all dead. Something killed them. Cue goose bumps."

"Anyway, might be that thing that's blocking the signal?" Margo finished.

"Then we obviously need to shut it down," Milou said, after recovering from her first shock of Margo and Zidler craziness that the rest of the survivors were all so used with. She threw them a suspicious look before she turned to Fox and Desmond. "Is there some sort of radio tower on this island?"

Fox turned pale. Desmond sighed. "I wouldn't know. Spent my time down in the hatch mostly."

Milou looked at him strangely. "Hatch?"

"Yeah, long story," Zidler said. "Three years ago a wee Scottish man –"

"Should we go and discuss this somewhere else?" Milou cut him off. Desmond and Fred nodded and Fox mumbled a sheepish excuse as the four of them left to talk somewhere else.

"Some people just don't appreciate good stories," Margo said bitterly.

. .

"If it isn't Miss Hume."

Lori whirled around, more gracefully than she'd ever done since having been kidnapped by the Others, and she knew even though she couldn't see who the person was.

"If it isn't Mister Straume."

"What?" Desmond said when Lori shook hands with the man from the freighter. They were both smiling.

"You don't look surprised to… hear me," Miles said.

"Oh, that's because I've been kidnapped and locked up with dead bodies in a room by crazy murdering natives," Lori said just as cheerfully. "Nothing is really a surprise anymore. And, this." She waved at where she thought Desmond was standing. "Is my long lost brother who's been on this island for three years. I told you about him, right?"

"What?" Desmond and Miles said in unison.

. .

"Hey."

Fox looked up to where he saw Frederic Phelps stand awkwardly. His eyes went to Kim who was lying beside him, feverish and whining.

"Hey," Fox answered, swallowing. He didn't really know what Fred was doing here. They'd already discussed the sat phone – and yeah, Fox had disappeared pretty quickly after that but he had to go and check up on Kim.

"I –" Fred looked hesitant, fidgeting, pushing his glasses up his nose. "I don't quite know how to say this question without sounding paranoid and suspicious – guess we're all a little bit paranoid – I sure know that." (Just a tiny hint of bitterness in the last words.) "I used to study the list of everyone who was on the plane. Thought I knew every single name. Of course, I didn't account for the widely use of nicknames here. And… well, I guess it just is paranoia –"

"What is it t-that you want to ask me?" Fox himself was surprised at how strong his voice seemed, even with the stutter.

"I don't remember you from the manifest," Fred blurted out.

Fox abruptly stopped thinking of when Andrea was going to return with more water. He looked away so Fred wouldn't see how pale his face had gotten. He tried to calm his breathing as he said, "Well, my n-name is Fox Edwards. I was on the plane. Are you sure you sure?"

"No, not really." Fred bit his lip. It reminded Fox of someone, but he couldn't figure out whom. "This was really all an excuse to ask you something. You're quite the technician, right?"

"Um…"

"You sounded like you knew what you were talking about. Kind of like my friend Dan. Anyway, on the freighter Dan and I managed to communicate with the island – we thought that, at least, through a computer. We asked if they were a survivor of Flight 815, and they said yes, and said they were on an island. Do you know who that was? I think it might earn us some more trust points."

Fox shook his head and looked back at him again. "No. I don't."

"Oh. Right. I could help out, as I said before, with the sat phone."

"I'm busy," Fox replied. And to his relied Andrea stepped into the makeshift shelter just then, stopping whatever retort Fred had.

"What are you doing here?" she snapped at Fred, who turned red.

"I, I was just –"

"Go!"

Fred hastily retreated. Andrea's face was red also, but more in irritation than embarrassment.

"Can you give her this?" Andrea handed Fox a pill and a water bottle before he could answer. "I have to go. Get me if anything happens, all right? If the fever goes up… it shouldn't, but…"

"Yeah. I – I will."

Andrea walked off again, shoulders tense, and he wondered what was going through her mind at the moment. Andrea Widmore. Penelope Widmore. Confusion, he assumed, anger, betrayal.

He knew what he felt, and that was guilt.

He knew exactly what was blocking the signal; he knew that it wasn't broken. He could go up to the survivors right now and tell them the truth, get them rescued, and reveal to them he'd been an Other from the start.

_Had_ been. He wasn't anymore.

He hoped.

He hadn't seen Ethan in a long time at least.

"I…" The broken sound came from Kim, and his attention was immediately on her. She rolled her head to the side, and he stroked her hair away from her face, wishing she would open her eyes and look at him.

"Kim, i-it's m-me. Fox." He didn't know what else to say, Andrea would just babble on, saying it got through to her. What could he say? "It's g-gonna be okay." And it was so futile, such a ridiculous statement and so untrue.

"I know." She still hadn't opened her eyes. Fox swallowed.

"W-what? Kim –"

"I know what you are. But it's okay. You're…" She began to mumble things he didn't understand.

. .

"Um, Owen, is it okay if I ask you a question?"

Owen took off her sunglasses and looked at Claire through narrow eyes. "What?"

"Why are we sun tanning on your porch?" She looked utterly confused. It was understandable, but they were on a beautiful tropical island – it would be a crime not to use the little things they got.

Claire looked better than the last time she saw her, less hysterical, but still harried and scared.

"Why are we doing this?" Claire asked with a slight rise of worry in her voice.

"They need to see me." Owen gestured with a hand at the other house. "Know I'm here and not hiding somewhere crying my eyes out."

"Uh, why would you be crying?" Claire almost dared to smile at the thought.

"_Exactly_." Owen glanced to where Lalah was standing by a tree, watching them. She didn't know for how long Claire would be allowed to stay.

She put her sunglasses back on again. She could practically feel fear radiating from Claire. "Oh, don't worry." She rolled her eyes even though Claire couldn't see it, frustrated she whispered, "I have to play along with it, okay? For now. It's all right. All is going according to plan."

"What plan?"

Owen chose not to answer that, she was above such things.

"So they trust you?" Claire asked her.

"As much as they trust a sleeping dragon. But in comparison to you… yeah."

"Then… where's Boone?"

. .

Boone immediately stood up when he saw the door swing open. In came two guards, half-carrying a person between them. He took a quick step back when they opened his cell door, and closed it again behind the man who stumbled on his feet before he fell to his knees –caught by Boone.

"I didn't do it so you could beat him senseless all the time!" Boone screamed at the guards who just disappeared through the door without any words. Brian's eyes were swollen, bruises around them. He swallowed a burn in his throat. He tried to see clear – but everything was a blur and it hurt too much.

"What… what did you do?" He asked through broken lips with a hoarse voice.

. .

"Here!"

Kaylee almost toppled over when Dom threw the bag at her, regaining her posture she glowered at him, but he didn't notice, having thrown another backpack at Kate who threw it back at him.

Dom glared at the two of them like they were the crazy ones. "What the hell, Kate?"

"These are my clothes." Kaylee looked into the bag and up at Dom. "What's going on?"

"What's going on is that we have to get the hell out of Dodge," Dom said seriously, looking over his shoulder. Looking back at them, he continued, "If these people are who they say they are – we're in some deep trouble."

Kate seemed to understand, and said in a low voice, "Do they even know who we are?"

Dom shrugged. "I dunno. Haven't exactly gone up to them and said, 'Hey, name's Dominic Austen. Yeah, you've might have heard of me. On the run from the law and all.'"

Kate sighed. "Dom –"

"Don't got the time to be polite, sis. We're going now. And Kay –"

Kaylee who'd been silently contemplating about something looked at him.

"– don't even think about it. We have to stick together now. Especially you have to stay close to me."

Kate looked from one to the other, a frown on her face as Kaylee looked down. "Where are we going to go?" she asked her brother. "How well have you thought this through? Maybe they won't arrest us. Maybe –"

Dom's eyes turned dark. "I'm not worried about getting arrested."

Kate's frown turned deeper. "Then what are you –" She stopped when Kaylee elbowed her not so subtly.

One of the women of the freighter walked up to them. There was something unsettling in the way she was looking at them all, eyes slowly going over their faces, almost calculating.

Kate recognized her as Jóhanna – Janna. The woman Naomi had supposedly arrived with. The woman who'd supposedly saved Sawyer too.

She stopped right beside Kaylee, who looked at her with wide eyes.

"Hello," Janna said.

Kaylee took an immediate step closer to Dom, who cleared his throat and stared right at her. "Hello, yourself. Mind you, but we were having a private conversation."

"Of course you were." The woman smiled, and it looked so absolutely wrong on her face. "But isn't the matter of getting rescued more important than whatever problem you might have?"

"Yeah, sure –"

"You were here from the beginning? I heard some people," she tilted her head to the side, "had 'joined' from some other section, the tail, I think?"

Kate crossed her arms. "Yeah, we were all in the middle section." It wasn't exactly true, as Kaylee had been out in the jungle, while they'd been on the beach but that didn't matter.

"Have any of you died?" The question was completely blunt and without any emotion or empathy.

"What? Seriously?" Dom sputtered. "How can you even…"

Kaylee put a hand on his arm to stop him from doing anything stupid. "Yes."

"And what were the causes of their deaths?" she asked, unfazed by the murdering look in Dom's eyes.

Kate shifted uncomfortably on the spot, thinking of Charlie, of Rosalie. _We_, she thought. _We are the reason they're dead._

"Plane crashes kill many people," Kate said with worried look at Kaylee, who seemed to have her thoughts elsewhere, about someone she had herself killed. _Self-defense_.

"I saw a door with the text 'Quarantine' on it. Some mentioned it was from an explosion. From what?"

"From the hatch," Kaylee said, snapping out of her thoughts. She looked back at Kate, both thinking about the same thing.

"Hatch?"

"It was a – a sort of station," Kaylee continued.

"What kind of station?"

"From something called the Dharma Initiative. You had to push this button every 108 minutes or" – she glanced at Dom – "_something_ would happen."

"Could I see this hatch? Maybe it could be of help –"

"You can't!" Dom snapped, sounding ore unfriendly than he should, but it was bringing bad memories for all of them. "It blew up, okay?"

"Why?" There was something that could be a reminiscent to excitement in Janna's voice.

"Because two persons thought nothing would happen," Kate said, "so they locked themselves down there and didn't push the button and the rest is history."

"So the hatch exploded when they didn't push the button?"

It felt like they'd answered too many questions, but if they didn't answer more it would get suspicious. They didn't have the excuse of not trusting them now, when they'd proved that they were from the freighter.

So Kate decided to go with the closest to truth she could, the information didn't matter now, did it?

"No, something happened, some electromagnetic charge. Some say the sky turned purple because of it. So the hatch didn't just blow up because we didn't push the button we had to blow it up because we didn't push the button."

If Janna thought the explanation was weird – she didn't show it. "You said some of you had locked themselves down there. Did they die in the explosion?"

Kate thought about Dom, who Desmond had found in the jungle, of Owen who Kaylee said looked absolutely crazy when she came back, and Eko who died minutes after Zidler found him.

"No," Kate replied, "no. No one did."

"Not even the one who blew it all up?"

Kate could feel Dom glare at the back of her head. "No."

Kaylee suddenly grabbed Dom's arm. "I feel dizzy."

"You mean you're sick again?" Dom asked in surprise.

"Yeah," Kaylee nodded. "Yeah. I think I need to lie down. Kate, help me get me back to the tent."

"Yeah, we should stay with you to see if you're all right," Kate agreed. "Sorry, but if you want to ask more questions go see Margo and Zidler," Kate told Janna. _Good luck_, she added in her mind.

"You're stupid, Kate," Dom said when they were out of ear-shot.

"Stupid? Creative line. That woman –" Kate looked over her shoulder at her "– we can't lie to her."

"She's right," Kaylee said.

"And sudden sickness?" Dom turned to her. "The best you could do?"

"Like you would come up with anything better," she muttered and stood on her own.

"We stay put," Kate said, "for now. See how this turns out. We can't turn our backs on everyone now."

. .

"It's supposed to be here," Flor muttered, looking around at the rocks, stones and trees around them. They were by the edge of a cliff, but there was _nothing_ there. The sun had started to go down, and she was scared they would have to look for another night. They didn't have time.

"No kidding." Sawyer looked just as lost as she, an irritated look on his face as he kicked a stone. It hit a rock with a satisfying thud.

"Don't shoot me just yet. Perhaps –" Flor frowned, looking over at the cracks in the Cliffside – "on the other side of the cliff…"

Sawyer spat, "Perhaps we should've kept the map instead of given' it to Tweedledee and Tweedledum."

Flor didn't look at him, but kept her gaze on the gritty surface. "They needed it more than us." Before Sawyer could protest she continued, "We should look around more. It's not like there's a sign above it saying enter."

Sawyer muttered but walked away from her. Flor turned her eyes to the sky and hoped Bonnie and Locke were having better luck than them.

. .

"Bonnie. Stop!"

Bonnie froze in her tracks, suddenly seeing what Locke had wanted her to stay away from. It was a pylon. As she squinted through the falling darkness, she saw other ones going further into the jungle on her sides.

She turned around, looking at Mary Jane who stood there simply staring indifferently.

"What are these things?" Bonnie yelled at her.

Mary Jane was silent. Bonnie growled, took a step towards her but Locke stopped her. "Calm down. We discussed this with Sawyer and Flor. We need to find some way around it."

"Why can't we just go between them?" Bonnie asked.

"I believe they're a security perimeter. See those sensors?" Locke pointed at them. "I think they would be triggered if we tried to pass by them. An alarm system."

"A trap?"

"Either way, we can't be sure we'll be safe if we go between them."

"But there's no way around, these things encircle the entire Barracks."

Locke sighed, put the map back in the bag. "Well, then."

He turned around, and advanced towards Mary Jane slowly. Bonnie realized suddenly what was going to happen. She reached out with a hand to protest –

Mary Jane threw a blow at his face, her fist connected with his jaw and Locke's head flew back. He stumbled on his feet backwards, a hand taking stand against a tree. Bonnie immediately swung her gun out at the woman."Stop!" she called out.

With a well-aimed kick to the ribs Mary Jane had Locke gasping for air. Bonnie didn't know if she should shoot or not. But the decision was made for her as Mary Jane snatched the gun right from Locke and pressed it against the back of his skull, hiding behind him so that Bonnie would have a harder time to aim.

"Let him go!" Bonnie shouted. Locke held his hands out, as in surrender. Mary Jane slowly moved backwards, bringing Locke with her.

"I will. What do you say if I make you a deal?"

"A deal?" Bonnie carefully took a step forward, and Mary Jane stopped.

"Don't listen to her lies, Bonnie," Locke said.

"You stop talking," Mary Jane said to him. She turned her gaze back to Bonnie. "I'll let go of him. If you let me go without a scratch on me."

"You know what, honey?" Bonnie said sweetly. "I don't think that's going to happen."

Bonnie fired her gun. Locke ducked, hit the gun out of Mary Jane's hands and twisted her arms around so they were on her back. Mary Jane cried out in pain. Locke pushed her past Bonnie who was still holding the gun in the air and threw her between the two pylons.

Mary Jane staggered on her feet, almost losing balance. She swung around –

She froze.

A sound, a loud buzzing tone sounded between the two pylons. Mary Jane's jaw was clenched, but her mouth started to foam. She sputtered – eyes widening in horror – blood started to come out of her ears, on the sides of her mouth, out of her nose and a trail down her left eye.

"Oh my God," Bonnie breathed, utterly speechless.

Mary Jane fell down to her knees. She closed her eyes. The buzzing stopped and she fell on her side.

Locke wiped the blood off his lip, and turned to Bonnie. He didn't say anything, but his eyes spoke for themselves.

Bonnie swallowed, tore her gaze away from the dead woman lying there on the jungle floor.

They needed to find another way in.

. .

Kim woke up in the morning; the fever had gone down during the night. And the first thing she saw when she opened her eyes was the side of the shelter, and with a frown she'd asked Fox why they were in Alaska.

"How are you feeling?" Andrea asked her, sitting down beside her on the blanket.

"Like my leg is broken and my ribs are crushed and like there is nothing to take away the pain."

Andrea turned her eyes down sadly.

"But I'm alive." Kim smiled weakly, meeting Andrea's gaze and she smiled back. "Thank you, Andy."

Andrea's smile faltered slightly as Kim bit her chapped lip. She still had bruises on her face, a horrid ugly colour around her eye. She was worried about how it would heal… But it didn't matter, Kim wasn't okay, not really, but she was alive and she was going to survive. They weren't in a hospital, Andrea didn't know the extension of her wounds inside her body and there could still be fatal injuries.

"Um…" Kim looked unsure. "I'm sorry."

It was hard to tell, but it almost looked like she was blushing.

"Why are you sorry?"

"Because… we fought, and I yelled at you."

"When?"

"About Fox, do you remember?" She was definitely almost blushing. And Andrea suddenly did remember, remembered her suspicions, and remembered the Black Rock ledger and suddenly all that didn't matter.

"Don't worry. I hardly remember it."

"But I do," Kim mumbled, not high enough for Andrea to really hear what she said. "He really took care of me? After… after the cave fell down on us. And he – he was okay?"

She knew Kim was talking about Fox. "Yeah, he was fine," Andrea assured her. "And he tried to look after you, at least."

Kim smiled. She turned her gaze to the entrance of the shelter as Fox came in, followed by Desmond and Lori.

"You're awake!" Desmond exclaimed, he sounded quite happy, but the smile on his face was forced, more obviously on the smile on his sister's face. Andrea knew they were going through a rough time.

"I would believe that's obvious, Des." Lori sat down, a careful hand trailing over to find Kim's.

Kim took her hand, still very weak. "Not really… uh, barely."

"I'm glad you pulled through." The two women sat there together, having what could be called a moment.

Andrea awkwardly cleared her throat, reminding Lori that she wasn't the emotional type as she quickly let go of Kim's hand and flew up.

Kim turned her head to Fox. "I think I'm gonna –" she mumbled something in Japanese and closed her eyes, lying down.

"Poor gal," Desmond said solemnly.

"I'm still awake," Kim muttered.

. .

"How are we gonna get in now?" Bonnie asked even though she knew that Locke didn't have the answer.

Locke strokes his jaw. "We build a ramp."

Bonnie sighed. Nothing surprised her anymore. "Okay."

. .

Flor saw the sun disappear, the stars get lit, and she suddenly knew where they had to go.

Sawyer followed her with protests, but Flor knew the threats meant nothing anymore as she found the place.

The hieroglyphs were just like the sign they'd been missing. She ran through the tall grass and the red flowers until she reached the vines hanging down on the hillside.

"We need to climb," she said.

"Climb? What the –"

"The map is lying – or well, the map is wrong. I realized it." Flor wrapped her hands around the vines. "Staring at it – it's completely wrong. Whoever made it didn't account for some things."

"What things?"

Flor smiled as she steadied herself to take the first step. "Time."

She started to climb.

When Sawyer finally reached the top, Flor was practically jumping of excitement. She set off before he could take a moment to breathe and he stumbled after her.

"The tunnels aren't on the side of a cliff or hill – it's inside."

"You're making no sense." Sawyer didn't even have the strength to muster up a nickname for her. But yet he blindly followed her.

Finally, after a very long time Flor slowed down. Sawyer walked up beside her and saw broken stones, rocks, a collapsed cave.

"Is this –"

"This is it." Flor carefully stepped over the stones. "There's a way here for us to get in."

Sawyer took out the flashlight, they were gonna need it.

. .

**Author's Notes: ***Suppresses the urge to somehow manage to hug you through the internet*

Because THAT would be creepy. Over some flailing over your answers at the survey, I want to present you with this huge **THANK YOU.** I'm hoping to get faster updates now, yay?

I ship Owen/Awesome too by the way.

Namaste.


	48. Light

_A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,_  
_Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would control,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
For that bright hope at last  
_And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,

- By Edgar Allan Poe

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 40, Light **

**. . . .**

Lalah Star Lee was not looking forward to returning home. It wasn't that she didn't want to see her family after one night away. She loved them. She was closer to her parents and closer to her siblings than most people she knew – and she liked that.

What she wasn't looking forward to was the family dinner where everybody was sure to be asking her how the sleepover at Jenny's went. Did you have fun? What movie did you watch? Were you able to sleep? Why did you leave so early?

Lalah had fun. They watched the Wizard from Oz. She had slept well but woken up before everyone else. She left early because she couldn't stand the feeling of not truly belonging.

That's what would've happened if Lalah hadn't forgotten that that book that she really, really wanted to show Jenny and Amelia because they were interested in the Wild West just like she.

Jenny's mom said she would wait in the car and Lalah hurried into the house. She had her own key just in case.

Their new house was, in her mother's words 'quite historical.' Lalah wasn't sure how far back it was dated. But there was something charming with the white paint falling off and the rust doorknobs and creaking floors.

There was always 'something' about every new place she and her family moved to. She could find the beauty in small, cramped apartments and uniqueness in rows and rows of identical stilt houses.

The thing about their new house was that it was never silent, but now it was.

"Dad?" Lalah called out carefully, walking across the long hall. She looked inside the rooms that the open doors led to. "Mom?"

She frowned as she heard something like a muffled thud. With a quicker pace she walked out to the backyard. Their house was surrounded by many trees, lying very far away from the nearby town.

She passed the place where the slave quarters used to be – a story her father had told her in a grave voice. She knew that sound, but she didn't dare to believe what she was hearing. Because that was impossible – there were no animals in the forest, so there was no reason hunters would be shooting, and not so close to their house.

Jenny's mom was probably getting annoyed waiting. The mental image of her lightning a cigarette in irritation disappeared when she heard another shot. And a shout.

She started to run, dodging trees and quickly jumping over holes and stones in the ground until she saw them. She hid behind a tree quickly. Her heart beat hard in her chest at what she'd seen. Carefully she looked over at them again.

A shot rang out and the bullet pierced the target in the middle, leaving a frayed hole. Her older sister was smiling slightly, her father congratulating her with a pat on the back.

Her mother was helping her brother aim at another target – shaped like a person.

Lalah took a deep breath and looked away, fast but quiet she started to make her way back to the house.

"What took it so long?" Jenny's mom asked her when she sat down in the car.

Lalah looked down at her now very dirty shoes, and then to the road in front of them as the car pulled out from the highway.

**. . . .**

The twig snapped under her feet as she bent down on her knees. Behind her Locke was hiding too, looking at the yellow houses behind the leaves. The image of Mary Jane's dead body faded from her mind as all she could think of was that they were finally here – here at the Barracks – the headquarters of the Others. And they had no idea what was coming for them.

Locke tapped her shoulder and pointed silently at something. She followed his gaze and saw that he was staring at one of the yellow houses. Outside two people were standing, and one was sitting in a wheelchair.

It was the man who said he was Frederic Phelps, Claret and a man –

Jack.

Despite the heat from the jungle and the sun above them Bonnie felt how she became cold from her fingertips to her face, as she stared at the group. She couldn't hear what they were saying but a smile spread on Claret's face and Jack laughed.

Bonnie's shoulders slumped, her entire posture fell, and what was left was just fatigue.

"This is Jack," Locke said in a low voice behind her. "The first time I saw him he was risking his life pulling people out of burning airplane wreckage. If he's shaking hands with the Others, I'm sure he has a good reason."

"Sure he does," Bonnie muttered. "What's Claret's reason?"

"Claret is a confused woman." It was all Locke said, and Bonnie realized that was all they knew of the woman. That she had been scared, sweet, quiet. Never in the center of things. Never really belonging.

Bonnie looked to see if she had extra clips of ammo in her bag, which she had. "What are you doing?" Locke asked her.

She started to load her gun. "Preparing to shoot people."

"Are you sure that's the best way to do this?" Locke said.

"We're here to rescue Eva," Bonnie replied without looking at him. "Okay? That's what we're here to do. We're supposed to do this."

Locke calmly tried to meet her gaze. "Sawyer and Florence said you were going to wait until dark before you did anything."

"Well," Bonnie said, "Flor also said they're just as dangerous at day as at night. Does it matter?"

"It matters because they are going to be here then and for you to succeed in this – you need them."

Bonnie finally looked at him. Her eyes narrowed. "What about you?"

"I'm not here for the same reason as you." Locke smiled.

Bonnie looked down, she let out a long breath. "Okay." She stood up, taking the backpack from the ground and putting it on as she did so. Locke stared at her. She started to walk away.

"Bonnie!"

She turned her head to the side, didn't look at him but stopped.

"That's my bag." Locke stood up too.

Bonnie smirked, glancing his way. "Yeah. I know. And I'm taking it."

"Why are you…?" He started to walk towards her.

"Do I need to remind you that I got a weapon?" Bonnie snapped and Locke froze. "I woke up that night, y'know. When you were supposed to be holding guard? You were nowhere around. Didn't think of it much until the Flame station blew to pieces. I guess I now know why. Sorry, Locke. But you were right; we have to wait until tonight. No need to create havoc right now. I need the _all_ explosives to make a distraction later."

Bonnie walked away until he couldn't see her anymore because of the leaves, and he turned his gaze back to Jack.

**. .**

The sun had just risen, but it was warm and the sunrays were shining right at Owen's porch so why not make the best of the situation?

"Hi," a careful voice said, and Owen opened her eyes, looking over to where Claire was standing on the first step. She looked confused. Owen was tanning again. And yes, she was in the middle of a little community but no one had complained about it... yet.

Claire looked better than the last time she saw her, less hysterical, but still harried and scared.

"Take a seat," Owen gestured with her hand, sitting up from her chair.

"Um, no, it's okay."

"Okay." Owen saw Lalah stand over by the trees, keeping an eye on them. Owen waved. She waved back. Claire looked even more confused.

"Um, I'm not allowed to talk for long," Claire said, glancing at Lalah again. "I wanted to see you, I heard about the man you were supposed to kill."

Owen tensed. "Oh."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

"Why would it matter?" She didn't say that she thought Claire was broken; she couldn't just drop something like that on her. She would get crushed.

Claire looked away, tears in her eyes. Owen didn't want her to cry again, she couldn't handle the mess now. She seemed to hold herself together, though, as much as she could.

"Because it can't be easy," Claire said in a low voice, "being in control over life and death, can it?"

Death and death was more right.

"What would you do if you were in my seat?"

"Did he really ruin your life?" Claire quickly asked.

Owen wasn't as fast with the reply, but put her sunglasses on again and leaned back in the chair. "You would do anything for your kid, right?"

"Yeah." Claire said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, which it was.

Owen saw Lalah start to stride towards them.

"Would you avenge him?"

**. .**

"What are they working on?" Kim asked Andrea as she was given a bowl with food. Andrea looked over to where Milou, Fred, Lori and Desmond were talking, pieces of technology that they'd salvaged spread out between them.

"They have this idea," Andrea said, not trying to hide the doubt in her voice, "that we can locate where the French message was transmitted from by triangulating the signal."

"How?" Kim asked her, eyebrows pinched.

"Why don't you ask Fox?" Andrea said and walked away as he approached them.

Fox looked after Andrea, looking a bit confused at her sudden depart. He then looked down at Kim who nodded and he sat down beside her outside the tent.

He glanced at her leg, which was hidden underneath a blanket.

Kim bit her lip, not wanting to think more of whether or not it would heal. "So, how are they going to... tri – tri – something that signal?"

"They're t-trying to make an antenna. Three, a-actually. They're going to put one on the beach. One in the jungle. One on higher ground. If the source is somewhere within the t-triangulation, they'll find it. But... there's so much that could go wrong! Who knows how long the power cells will last and – w-what?"

Kim put down the bowl, she couldn't eat anymore. Her throat hurt and she was too tired. She leaned her head on his shoulder instead. "Fox," she said silently, "you do want to get rescued, don't you?"

She didn't see how pale he had gotten. "Yeah, o-of course."

"I could show you lots of things. Like, the world. Whole world. There's so many places I haven't seen yet." She started to mumble in Japanese.

"Okay," Fox whispered silently.

**. .**

Miles hurried over to where Milou was speaking with Libby. "Hey!" He grabbed her arm, as a reflex she punched him. Libby gasped and Miles covered one of his eyes with his hand. Teeth clenched he managed to say, "Need to talk to you. _Now_."

Milou apologized as she joined Miles, Janna and Fred, who was currently looking a little too pleased at the fact that Miles was hurt.

Miles looked a little awkward, touching at the place where Milou had hit him, squirming. "I went to see their graves – graveyard. They got a whole bunch of dead people. Thought you might be interested in what I –"

Milou snorted.

Miles glowered at her, but continued. "What I heard. Remember Naomi? Brown hair, Manchester accent, _hot_ Manchester accent –"

"Yes. We do remember her, Miles. What's..." Fred frowned. "What's going on? Do you know where she is? No one would tell me."

"Yeah," Miles said, suddenly sounding like he was out of breath, and he turned his gaze to some place distant further up the beach. "She's buried over there."

He could practically see Milou's entire doubts flood out of her, her eyes widened just slightly which not many would take for surprise. But he knew that all that control she was so insistent on having, was becoming a chaos here on this island.

Miles didn't even care to look at Janna to see her reaction. She would be stoic, as usual. But the absence of her words felt a little unnerving.

"What?" Fred finally managed to get out, reflecting what they were all thinking.

"Naomi is dead. Buried. Gone. Whatever. She was shot by one of them." He gestured with a hand at a group of survivors at their rebuilt dining table.

Janna looked over to where Milou was carrying a gun in her holster, raising an eyebrow. "Let's take care of them."

"Whoa," Miles said, putting his hands up, "okay. I know Naomi was shot by them, but, uh, we can't just go and shoot _them_."

"I see no problem with it," Janna said.

"Miles is right," said Milou. "He just believes he knows that Naomi is buried there. He doesn't know for sure. Does he?"

Miles sighed, glancing at Janna. "I'll go talk to Lori. She can answer our questions."

"The blind girl?" Milou only looked mildly surprised. "Well, you do that. You seemed friendly with each other. And Janna, Fred, let's not cause any disturbance with this. We don't know the whole story and we don't need more..." She looked at something past them, "inconveniences right now."

**. .**

Zidler was just minding his own business, as usual, when he decided to look over the traps. Nobody had bothered to wonder how the people from the Freighter had managed to get into the camp unscathed, but he did. Well, that and he was bored. He was apparently banned from any important A-team meetings which meant he didn't have a clue what was going on.

He wasn't as suspicious as one would think, he was quite sure that everything would be sorted out and they would help them off the island. What came then, well, that was another thing.

He stopped in his tracks, and looked to the side, thinking he'd heard something. He saw a glint of someone sitting down by a tree. Carefully and quietly he began to walk towards the person, shoulders were shaking, face turned down, soft sobs.

Hs heart sank in his chest as he realized it was Wendy.

"You know," he said as he approached her, "most people are actually happy now. Smiling. Remember that? Looks like this." He grinned; Wendy looked up and wiped away her tears.

"Oh yeah," she muttered. "The just in time rescue."

Zidler didn't really know what he was supposed to say, so he sat down beside her instead. He thought she had been doing better, after the whole Karl thing. Everybody was sad, of course. But Wendy... she was supposed to be the strong one.

But after her getting taken by the Others...

"You don't seem happy about that at all."

"I saw her, you know," Wendy said, staring blindly in front of her. "That freighter woman. With the scars, the black hair and those cold eyes. I saw her when I was escaping from... from, you know. I think I did. Gosh!" She buried her head in her hands, sighing before looking up again. "I can't – it's all so messed up. Reality. So freaking hard to figure out."

He glanced at her and saw that she was staring at him. "What?" he said confused.

"You can go if you like. I was just... sobbing. I'm not gonna dash wildly into the jungle again."

Zidler laughed. "That was quite the adventure."

"Yeah," Wendy nodded slowly. "Then Charlie died."

Zidler's smile fell off his face, Wendy noticed it. "Oh – I – sorry. I wasn't thinking. Hell." She looked away, a finger touching her trembling lip. "I don't _think_ anymore. I was just – I'm so stupid. Hurley just started talking to me, and he was talking about his mom and I just – I just couldn't." She stood up, avoiding Zidler's gaze.

"I'm actually thinking of taking off," Wendy told the place above Zidler's head. "You know, get out for a while. Sort myself out. Be alone."

"What? But you just said no more dashing wildly into the jungle! We're getting recued –"

"Are we? Because last time I checked they're not able to contact their boat –"

"They're trying!" Zidler stood up. "They're gonna do this tri – tri – thing."

Wendy held up a hand. "Okay, I don't wanna know. I just – I can't take this mess. Problems here and problems there – " she pointed a finger at herself " – and I thought my life was complicated before I got here!"

"You're just overreacting," Zidler muttered. He quickly regretted it as Wendy walked right up into his personal space, glaring at him.

"Yes. Maybe I am! Miss Wendy Reyes, feeling so sorry for herself because her boyfriend died in her arms, and because she was kidnapped and because _she left everybody behind!_" she screamed the last part, red in her face. She took a step back, wildly gesturing with her hands. "With Mister Montgomery Zidler, the nice boy who always tries to cheer everyone up because he himself is so miserable because the girl he loves is having another man's baby. Why don't you just leave me the hell alone?"

She looked like she immediately regretted her words, gasping when she realized what she said.

"Why don't you just leave then?" Zidler shouted back.

"Maybe I will!" Wendy yelled in response, all her guilt washed off, replaced by fury. She walked past him, not without bumping angrily into him first.

"Fine!" Zidler roared. "Good luck surviving alone with polar bears and – and angry mutant giraffes!"

Wendy didn't shout back but hurried away the fastest she could. Zidler was left fuming on the spot. He kicked a stone on the ground. He didn't feel better.

**. . **

Kaylee was sitting on a flat stone, just outside the camp. The sun was burning her back, and her feet were buried in the sand. Her gaze was turned out on the ocean, it calmer than usual today.

She tore her gaze from the endless waves rolling in on the shore, to the camp, seeing Dom leaning against a palm tree, scribbling something down in a notebook with a concentrated look on his face.

She bit her lip and looked out at the sea again, before she struggled up to her feet and with a fast pace made her way over to Dom.

He didn't look up, even when she was right in front of him. Kaylee stared and said, "How's it gonna happen?"

"What?" He glanced at her, before he went back to his notebook.

"How do I die?"

Dom almost dropped the notebook at the question; he blinked rapidly, looking like he'd just woken up from a long sleep. His eyes looked like they couldn't focus on her, flickering. "Uh, um..."

"We have to talk about it sometime," Kaylee said quietly. "This – this thing."

Dom looked down. Kaylee wasn't sure if she wanted to scream at him or comfort him. So instead she crossed her arms and sighed in frustration.

"Hey, guys."

They both turned their heads to the side where they saw Kate walking towards them. "Food's running short. So I thought I would go and pick some more fruit, want to come?"

Kaylee looked at Dom who was looking away; she turned back to Kate and faked a smile. "Sure, yeah."

Dom looked at Kaylee who was looking at Kate and wished he could tell her what was on his mind.

Kate frowned slightly, wondering what the hell was going on.

**. .**

She pulled a strand of hair behind her ear, and nervously said, "My name is Margo."

Janna looked at her with cold eyes.

She probably didn't care, not even a little bit.

"Uh, um. What was it that you wanted to ask me?"

Janna turned her gaze over to where Kate, Dom and Kaylee were talking. Margo noticed a long nasty scar on her back though her white tank top. She didn't say anything about it as Janna turned her eyes back to her.

"I heard before about some hatch. You needn't explain it; I just wondered who were in that curious explosion that happened."

"Oh, yeah." Margo desperately hopes someone would come and talk to Janna instead of her.

"And...?"

"Oh, right. So Eko was in the explosion. But he's dead now. And there was Owen and Locke, but Owen is with the Others and no one knows where Locke is. There's Kate, she somehow got to a cave from the hatch. And of course," Margo said with a sigh, "there's Dom."

"Dom?"

"His name is Dominic Austen, he and Kate are siblings. And he... he was the one who turned the failsafe key and blew it up." Margo had absently put a hand over her belly.

"Interesting," Janna said.

"Some would say it was mad," Margo joked.

Janna didn't look amused.

Margo excused herself when she saw Fred walking towards them; she hurried over to him and grabbed his arm. "She's so scary! How did you survive with her? Why didn't she kill you all?"

Fred wasn't so sure about the answer to that question.

**. .**

"Lori!"

Lori took a deep breath, counted to ten, and stayed still until her brother caught up to her. "Des, 'sup?"

"I don't understand that word," Desmond said. "What I do understand is that you've been avoiding me."

"What gave you the first clue?" Lori said, and thought of how Desmond had practically chased her around the camp.

"You talked before, to that man from the freighter, and you said some things – Lori, you have to tell me what happened to you when you were with the Hostiles."

"Why?" Lori snapped and began to walk again.

"Because otherwise I will not be able to help you, sis."

"I don't need your help, okay? I don't. You were gone for three years, and during those years I handled my demons just fine on my own." Lori wrung her hands. "If you – if you wanna help me. Then maybe you can give me some magical cure to get my eyesight back so I can go on a stupid, stupid quest to save a stupid, stupid doctor."

Lori dashed off before Desmond could say anything, angry tears burning in her eyes; she refused to let them fall.

"Where's the fire?" a familiar voice said, Lori stopped, tilting her head to the side. She felt Miles presence. He didn't touch her or anything to tell her where he was, and she appreciated it. Somehow a stranger that she'd met in some other life could know one better than family.

"Straume, do you want something?" Lori said.

"So, I was over lookin' at your graveyard, and I must say –"

"What did you hear?" Lori interrupted him.

"Naomi."

"And now you want an explanation?"

"Hell yeah, unless you want Psycho Janna to shoot everyone..."

"Sit down." Lori flopped down on the sand, not caring where they were. Warily, Miles did the same. "What do you know?"

"I know that some guy named Michael shot her, and some other chick called Florence was trying to help her but more really just that Naomi couldn't believe that it was ending now. 'Too soon,' was all she was really thinking."

"Okay, no one here has really told anyone the whole story. Too sad, too real, too painful. There was this guy, Michael, and this girl, Florence. They were in the crash, they were both parents. And Michael, he had this kid with him, Walt. And he wanted nothing else than to get the hell off this island. So he built a raft, we all helped him, and with him he took his son, Flor, me and the Korean guy Jin.

"The Others – you call them the natives – showed up with a boat. Pretended at first to be rescuing us, but then they took Walt, Flor and blew our boat up. We survived, obviously. But Michael ran off to search for his son while we returned to the camp. And days went until they came back, Flor and Michael, he had supposedly saved her. Everyone was happy, things were looking bright, hope was found again the whole thing – when Rosalie and Naomi were found dead, believed to have been killed by the Others.

"But it was them. People we've lived with from the beginning, who betrayed us. So now Naomi is dead. Flor is gone. Michael has left the island. And Rosalie's never coming back."

"Cool story." Miles stood up, he didn't sound any moved or touched at all by her words.

Lori looked bemused. "Where are you going?"

"To see if it's true. Visiting this Rosie-person."

"I'm offended for her sake!" Lori said and quickly got up to her feet, hurrying after him in not the most graceful manner.

She stumbled into him, pretending she had done so on purpose as she pulled her hair back from her face. Lori felt nothing, so she wasn't sure if they were by the right grave.

"Does the cross say Rosalie?" she asked.

"Yeah," Miles said. "It does."

She knew Miles had knelt down on the ground now, and she awkwardly stood there on the spot, not really knowing what she was supposed to do with her hands.

A moment later she heard Miles stand again, panting slightly. "Okay," he said. "Did you cremate her, scatter her ashes somewhere else?"

"Um, no. What –"

Miles turned to her. "Because there is nothing there."

"Yes there is. We buried her. No burning ashes." Lori bent down to the ground, put a hand above her grave. And she concentrated.

There was nothing.

But that didn't mean anything, after the Others... whatever she had been able to do wasn't the same anymore. She couldn't control it.

"We buried her here, I'm sure."

"There's _nothing,_ Lori! No emotions, no thoughts, nobody dies with nothing on their mind. No one dies feeling nothing!"

"Okay, maybe... Maybe her body has like... dissolved."

Miles was silent.

Lori sighed. "Yeah, I know. Worst theory yet." She massaged the back of her neck, trying to come up with a solution. "All right, go get the shovels."

"Why?"

"Because we got a grave to dig up."

**. .**

Fred was really becoming quite annoyed. There was the fact that most of the survivors were still suspicious, that not even Milou tried to tell him what was going on, and that there just wasn't any food left, but the thing that irritated him the most was how Janna kept avoiding him.

During other circumstances Fred would gladly avoid her; she wasn't as bad as other people said she was, she just wasn't... anyway, the point was that Fred needed to speak with her before he went mad.

"Janna, do you –" "Janna, can you tell me –" "Ja – ouch!" Was all he said before she rushed off again to do some important grown up business.

This time though, she wasn't getting away.

He hoped.

"Tell me everything about her, please!" The fact that he took her completely by shock was good start. He didn't try by saying 'Janna' first or anything, but she had to know who he was talking about.

Janna looked at him, and it wasn't that usual cold look that she gave everyone else, it was almost like she felt sorry for him. "I can tell you she took my weapons and knocked me out," she said all in one breath, there was just a slightly bit of resentment in her voice.

Fred gaped at her, and soon a big grin spread on his face. "Really?"

Janna furrowed her brow, placing a hand on her hip, and said with a poisonous tone, "You look a bit too pleased with that fact."

"Sorry, it's just that..." Fred continued to smile his silly grin, there were no words to express how he was feeling. Janna seemed to decide he was crazy, and left before he could ask her more questions. Well, there would be more time for that later. Now he had to go and fix the triangulation problem.

**. .**

Bonnie looked at the cameras, finding the blind spot where she was currently hiding, waiting for the night. She'd located the place where she thought Flor and Sawyer would arrive from, and she felt rising excitement in her chest, taking a battle with the betrayal from the sight before.

Bonnie knew what Eva looked like from pictures, but she hadn't seen the girl amongst all the people. What surprised her most about the Others was how – _normal_, they looked. Here, in their little community old people as well as children were smiling and living their lives. It was so distant from the Others she'd encountered, the enemies in the night.

Bonnie turned her head to the side – thinking she'd heard something. A man had dropped his laundry basket. Reassured, she leaned back against the tree.

A leave fell down in front of her eyes, slowly, until it landed on the ground.

A shadow fell over her feet, hiding her own.

The sun was still shining. Another leave fell to the ground. Bonnie reacted one second too late. She tried to leap away from the tree, but two strong hands were on her shoulder, one twisting around her neck and she stumbled backwards.

She sputtered, short breaths coming out as she desperately tried to claw her way free from whoever was holding her. Her eyes went to the gun left on the ground. She tried to kick backwards with her legs, but there came no sound, she twisted her head as much as she could to the side and she could see tawny hair and a man's face.

The man let go of one of her shoulders. She tried to punch him in the face, the angle was too weird to make any effect, but it took in him shock. She managed to almost get free. She whirled around, swinging another fist at the man's face but he ducked and she was sent stumbling at the tree.

She turned around. Just to face the gun pointed at her forehead.

She looked from the barrel of the gun to the man's green-blue eyes.

He dropped the gun on the ground. And with a well-aimed blow he knocked her out.

**. .**

Jack stopped smiling just as he closed the door to Ben's house, breathing in the air outside, hurrying down the stairs to be joined by Claret as they together walked away.

"I'm going to bed," Alex declared, without looking at her father, half hiding at the entrance to her room.

"This early?" Ben asked with slight surprise in his voice.

Alex didn't respond to that and closed the door to her room. Ben stared at it for a long time, before he wheeled back into his own room. The sky was darkening outside, and he reached for the lamp by the side of his bed.

The floorboards creaked behind him. Ben slowly let his hand fall to his side. "Alex?"

"Guess again."

Ben turned his head to the side. "Really, John, there's no need to point that gun at me."

"Shhh, keep your voice down," Locke whispered, closing his door as quietly as he could, the gun in his right hand.

As Ben put on the light on the lamp beside his bed, he thought of the hatch, of Locke, of the lie of _Frederic Phelps_.

Ben held up his hands. "All right," he said in a low voice, "it's all right, John. Just tell me –"

"Where is the submarine?" Locke interrupted him.

Ben almost smiled, trying to see indifferent, like the words meant nothing to him. "How did you even find us, John? And I'm not sure what you're talking about. What submarine?"

"The one you use to travel to and from the island."

"How do you –"

"Mikhail," Locke answered the question.

"Right to business, I assume." Ben arched an eyebrow. "Is that all you need to know? Where the submarine is? No questions about your friends..."

"Dad? Who are you talking to?" It was Alex's voice.

Ben looked at the door, desperately he shouted, "Alex, don't come in here!"

Locke turned around and quickly before anybody could protest he opened the door. He looked past Alex, there was knock on the door. He grabbed the girl and forced her into the room. She yelped, "What do you -! Dad? What's going –"

Locke covered her mouth, snarling at Ben, "Tell her to be quiet!"

"Alex, please!" Ben begged, glancing at the door.

"Ben?" a voice called from the hallway.

Locke pushed Alex into the closet, closing it behind them, with just a small spring so he could see outside. Alex was silent, looking down at the floor.

"What is it, Vincent?" Ben snapped at the man who'd just entered the room.

"It's that actress gal, McQueen. She found us."

"Where is she?"

"Niles took her down before she could do anything; they're at Jule's place. What should we do with her?"

Ben glanced at the closet, Locke showed him the gun. "I want to know how she found us," he said to Vincent slowly.

"You're saying –"

"Yes," Ben said abruptly. "Lock her up with _them_. And... can you please tell Richard to bring me the man from Tallahassee?"

"Uh, sure. What do you need him for?"

"Just do it. Now."

The sound of a door closing, and Locke stepped out of his hideout, gun still pointing at Alex's head.

"Why didn't you let Bonnie go?" Locke growled.

"Would you have let my daughter go, John?" Ben asked. Alex crossed her arms at Locke's side and Locke glanced her way. It hadn't really stricken him that the man in front of him had a child, father and daughter looked nothing alike.

"And what's the man from Tallahassee? Some kind of code?" Locke changed the subject.

"No, John, unfortunately we don't have a code for "There's a man in my closet with a gun to my daughter's head!" Ben said exasperated. With a long look at Alex he said, "Although we obviously should."

Locke decided to let the comment pass. "Bonnie, she had a pack with her," he pointed a finger at Alex, "and I want her to retrieve it."

"Okay," Ben said after a moment of silence." But you should know, John, my daughter currently hates me." Alex head shot up at that, and she gave her father an annoyed look. "So I'm not sure holding me hostage is your best option –"

"Dad!" Alex interrupted him. She turned to Locke. "I'll get your bag. Just don't..." She glanced at Ben, and without finishing her sentence she left.

**. . **

"What's going on?" Brian groaned, opening his eyes and sitting up.

Boone took a step back, leaning against the wall. "We're getting another roommate."

Their cell door opened, and in a blonde wild creature was thrown in. As the guards quickly locked the door she threw herself against the bars, screaming after them.

"Bonnie?" Boone asked, staring at the back of her head.

Bonnie's hands let go of the bars slowly, she turned around. She looked from Brian there on the floor, swollen eyes, bruises, to Boone standing before her, looking absolutely terrified.

"You – you're –" Bonnie stuttered.

"Alive," Boone and Brian said at the same time.

Brian sighed. "Don't tell me you tried to rescue us and failed."

"I – I wasn't –"

"Good," Brian said, his voice was hoarse, like it hurt for him to speak. "Uh, then why are you here? How's everybody at the camp? Are – are you all okay there?"

Bonnie still looked like she was trying to comprehend the fact that they were alive, no more answering their questions. She walked back and forth, running a hand through her tangled hair. "I can't believe this," she whispered to herself. "I can't..."

Boone carefully put a hand on her shoulder and she stopped. "Are you hurt?"

Bonnie shook her head. "No, no, I'm not. But –" She looked at Brian.

"I'm having a bad day," Brian joked.

"There's so much to tell you –"

"Start with how many came with you. Have they been taken too?" Boone asked Bonnie, looking into her eyes.

"No," Brian protested. "They can hea –"

"No they can't," Boone snapped. "Bonnie," he said again, gentler, "who are here with you? Do you have a plan?"

"We had," Bonnie said. "Sawyer, I and..." She looked him straight in the eye. "We've gone here to save Eva. You've seen her? Rosalie's daughter... She's taller than her and she got this smile – have you seen anyone?"

Boone shook his head. "Sorry, no. But – there are many more here. Hadn't you planned on –"

"Just Eva," Bonnie said, sounding a bit annoyed. "Sorry, no."

"Where's Sawyer?" Boone asked.

"He was going to take the tunnels – and – and –" She looked absolutely ruined, wringing her hand, but the tears in her eyes were from frustration not from sadness.

"Tunnels?" Bonne backed away from her, staring up at the surveillance camera.

Bonnie started to speak with Brian, but Brian was too busy watching Boone who looked like he was deep in thought.

Suddenly the door opened again. Bonnie swirled around, taking a step towards their cell door.

"No!" Brian protested, half-standing up as he dragged at Bonnie's arm to make her stand back. He didn't want her to get stunned.

"You come with us." They were looking at Boone.

"What do you want him for?" Bonnie shouted after them when they escorted Boone away.

**. .**

Ben and Locke were alone together, Ben was trying to sit up the best he could in the bed, but it wasn't easy. "I'm surprised," he finally said.

"Are you now?" Locke looked out the window, having seen Alex disappear into the dark moment earlier.

"I'm surprised that you are here. Asking me about the submarine, when your friends are here and you have no idea how they are."

"How are they, then?" Locke asked.

"They are good," Ben said simply. "You must've looked at the houses, seen how we live. This is better than anything you have at your camp."

"Ah, yes. You have it well here?" Locke turned to him. "With your lawns, electricity – I think I saw a refrigerator on my way here. You can communicate with the outside world whenever you want. And leave whenever you want in that submarine. And yet, you're in a wheelchair. I find that very interesting."

"Why do you find that interesting, John?"

Locke smiled. "Because even though you're the leader of these people, even though you act like you are so much in control. You are crippled. And I see that you're wondering why I'm walking while you aren't."

Ben shook his head to himself, chuckling slightly like he didn't believe the words Locke was saying. "Why would I be wondering why you're walking?"

"Because, from what I've heard you know everything about us, and then you should know that before I came here – I was crippled. Like you. And the second I came to this place –" The smile on Locke's face was now real "– I could stand and walk, something I hadn't done in years. And it was this place that did it."

"Are you afraid it'll go away, John?" Ben was completely serious now, his eyes thoughtful. "Is that why you want to destroy the submarine? Because you know if you ever leave this island you'll be back in the chair?"

Locke didn't answer, just as the door to Ben's bedroom opened again. It was Alex. Locke strode over to here and grabbed the backpack, checking to see what was inside. "Did you have any problems?"

Alex shook her head in answer.

"Here's how this is going to work," Locke said, looking up. "She's going to take me to the sub. Once we're there, I'll let her go."

Alex threw a worried glance at her father.

"John, she's done enough!" Ben protested, seeing Alex's gaze. "You don't have to do that. Destroy the sub. It is leaving tonight, it's a one-way ticket. The anomaly wiped out our communications. We have no way of contacting the outside world. Which means when that sub leaves, it can never come back. So whether you destroy the submarine or whether you let it go, the end result is the same. No one will find this island!"

"Come on," Locke said, not caring a bit about Ben's words. "Let's go." Alex reluctantly followed Locke out of the room.

Ben was left alone.

**. .**

"Don't you think anyone will complain?" Miles asked Lori, back bent as he dug up the sand with the makeshift shovel. The sun was going down, finally, since Miles had been about to die from the heat. And he was from Encino. He was used to heat that made one want to jump in the neighbour's pool.

"About what?" Lori asked, taking another break. Strands of brown hair had fallen out of her sad attempt to pull it back in a ponytail, hanging over her eyes.

"Nothing. I just thought grave digging was strange for you guys, obviously I was wrong."

Lori scoffed. "Nobody's coming this way," she said with certainty.

"How do you know?" Miles argued, glancing the way the survivors' camp was. Nobody had come this way, _yet_. "Sorry to be the one to break this to you, you're blind, Hume."

"Then I trust you to keep your eyes open," Lori said, almost cheerfully. "Nobody will come this way. Okay, keep digging."

"You keep digging," Miles muttered.

"Wow, good reply, smartass."

"Be careful so the sand doesn't hit your face, smartass."

"Ow!" Lori whined when Miles threw a little sand on her. They continued to dig in silence until Lori said, "Seriously, we have absolutely no respect for the dead, do we?"

Miles pondered on the question, resting from the work as he said, "We have lots of respect for the dead. It's the meat suits we don't care for."

He suddenly stopped digging, putting the shovel on the ground beside him he reached down with his hand through the compact sand.

"What is it?" Lori asked, sensing something change.

"It's a blanket."

Lori moved over to his side, leaning down, the knuckles of her fists barely touching the ground. "Do you want me to unfold it? I know how bad your nightmares can get –"

"There's nothing inside." Miles stood up, letting go of the stinking blanket. "It's just a blanket. You got any gave robbers in your camp?"

"I always found Owen a little fishy, but she's not here. Not many are here anymore. This just means... I don't know what the hell this means. Her body was put in the ground. She was buried. She was dead, all right? It's not like she just disappeared."

"Because things like that don't happen," Miles said, not really believing himself.

"Here they do."

Miles walked away to speak with his people, and she wondered how she would speak to hers. She would have to explain the dug up grave, when the survivors noticed what they had done.

She didn't feel sad, she just felt... like it was unfair. Somehow Rosalie hadn't been put to rest, and it wasn't fair because after everything the woman had been through – it felt like someone was choking her when she thought that Rosalie had never gotten to see her daughter before she was gone.

Kind of like how Lori had felt when Desmond had gone away on that sailing race, disappearing, left her behind.

She stood up, not bothering to brush the sand out of her hair and clothes, as she made her way back to the camp. She heard Desmond talk to Libby, when she approached them they both became silent.

"Can I talk to you?" Lori said, hopefully she was turned to her brother. She didn't like how her voice broke at the end.

"I'll leave you two alone." She heard Libby walk away.

"I need to say something to you before everyone becomes chaotic."

"Becomes?" Desmond said.

"Yeah. Um, I... I don't want to talk about it. I've said it before and I'm telling you again. I don't want to tell you what happened to me after you were gone. Because... that was really bad and I don't even want to think about it. But, you need to know..." She hated that she couldn't understand how he was looking at her, how he was feeling. Something had changed, she couldn't just know like before. She took a deep breath and continued, couldn't help her tearful voice, "I forgive you. I forgive you for not just disappearing on that sailing race but for fading away after Penny and for never being there even though you were right beside me." She was officially crying now. "Now I need you to forgive me. And understand that I've changed." She didn't want to beg. "Please." But it was what she did.

Desmond, who had been completely silent, wrapped his arms around her and held her close. And Lori could pretend for just a second that they were little kids again, and that all the years of pain hadn't ever existed. But it was wrong to pretend. Because they were here _now_, and they had to deal with it, they both had to stop escaping.

**. .**

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Lalah asked Garrett.

They were walking side by side on the small patch between the trees, behind them two others trailed after them, but Lalah only wanted to speak with the serious man.

Garrett looked up at the sky where stars were just starting to show up. "No. I am not," he replied after a while.

"Well," Lalah said, "it's not a very long walk. You should make up your mind soon, yeah?"

Garrett was silent, but the way his face became even more expressionless told Lalah that she'd offended him.

She sighed deeply. "Okay, I get it, y'know. Actually, we're kind of in the same boat, you and I. Ever thought of that?"

Garrett was still looking up at the sky.

"We've both been abandoned by the woman we love. And your daughter is gone and Ta –"

"You don't understand," Garret cut her off, almost sounding angry. "So do not try to pretend that you know anything about this. I think we should continue this walk in silence, yes?"

"Okay," Lalah said quietly, "you're awfully rude all of the sudden. Y'know, you can't let a girl break your heart like that."

"Maybe I should find a mentally ill woman to rebound with," Garret retorted, finally looking at her. Despite his words, there was something soft in his eyes.

Lalah halted, right where the trees stopped, and the pier began. She smiled slightly. "I'm still gonna miss you. Even though you've become a jackass. Wiser or not."

Garrett looked over to where the submarine lay in the water. "I..." He turned back to Lalah. He was making his decision. "I don't think I'm go –"

They were both knocked to the ground by a blast. Fire and smoke exploded into the air, waves crashed in over the dock, debris floated.

Lalah jumped up to her feet, the rain of fire drowned by the water, quickly making her way over to the person standing on the dock. Two guards hurried after her (coughing, weapons drawn) but Garrett watched them in the distance.

John Locke held his hands up as weapons were pointed at him, a slight smirk on his face when he knelt down.

Garrett looked up at the sky again.

**. . . .**

The smell of kitchen herbs filled the air when Lalah came home from the sleepover the next day. She dropped her bags just as she stepped in through the door, catching a glance at herself on the mirror at her side. She looked awfully tired. She smiled brightly which hid her exhaustion from the world.

She heard laughter. Opening the door to the dining room she could see her mom throwing her long hair back, eyes glittering as she giggled.

The floorboards creaked under her feet as she walked over to them.

"Hi, Lalah!" Her sister Amara said as Lalah sat down beside her at the table.

"How was it at your friend's? Did Jenny's mom give you a ride home?" Her mom asked, filling her glass with water.

Lalah shrugged. "Yeah, she did. It was cool."

At her dad's worried look she smiled again which seemed to calm him. It was nice to know they cared. But she wished they would lay off her. She liked her friends, she really did but she still missed their last home in Germany.

"I did happen to forget something though. So I came home yesterday to pick it up. But you weren't in the house," she said it all in a monotone voice and a sudden stillness that laid itself over her family.

"Yeeaah," her brother said, avoiding her eye. "I was at Jamie's. Studying."

There was an awkward silence, which her mother tried to fill with questions about her day.

"I saw what you were doing." Lalah interrupted her. "Shooting targets. Is that why we move around so much?"

All at once, they put down whatever they were holding in their hands, interrupting the dinner altogether.

"Lalah..." her mother began, but she didn't seem to find the words. She turned to her husband.

"Nia," her dad said to his wife, "it's time."

It all felt so grave, like the bombshell they were gonna drop on her was going to change her entire life. Lalah didn't dare to think of what they were going to tell her.

Still, they weren't saying anything yet.

"Really?" Amara suddenly said, with her voice all too loud in the unusual silence. "You're the adults!" she declared, even though Amara usually described herself as an adult too – just because she was the oldest of the three siblings. "If you can't tell, I will."

"You see, little sis," she turned to Lalah, "the reason we move 'round a lot. Never stay in one place. Got so much money. The fact that we were all practising firing bullets into targets yesterday – is because dad and mom are assassins."

It was quiet for a long time; they all looked at Lalah, awaiting her reaction.

"I can't believe you told them and not me!" she yelled at her parents, slamming both her hands down at the table. The glass toppled over. The red table cloth became darker with the water.

"You're not surprised our parents kill people?" her brother asked in a low voice. Lalah paid no attention to him.

"We wanted to tell you when the time was right," her mother said, trying to sound calm. But her eyes were wide and there was something unsettling in the way she was holding onto the edge of her chair. "We didn't want to pressure you. Affect who you are as a person."

"Me? As a person?" Lalah squeaked. She didn't seem to be able to outright explain how upset, betrayed and somehow disappointed she was feeling. Upset because they had kept it from her. Betrayed because they had trusted her siblings before her. Disappointed in the fact that she hadn't figured it out sooner. "Pressured?" she continued, standing up. "Why would I feel pressured?"

Her dad exchanged a glance with her mom. The way he looked at her – it was with some regret. "We didn't want you to be pressured into joining the family business."

"Family business?" She looked at her sister. "Oh. Well – business?" she repeated again.

"We work for the government."

Her brother snorted. "We work for the government?" he muttered. "Sounds like a really bad –"

"And the private industry."

"I'm thirteen!" Lalah yelled. "I have no idea what that means!" She pulled out her chair, not knowing what to do with her hands. In the end she rushed out of the room.

She was more upset that they'd kept it from her than that they'd killed people, from someone else's point of view, she realized, the whole exchange would seem hilarious, maybe it was the genes.

**. . . .**

Owen sat upright in bed, shoulders tensed, eyes roaming around the room, prepared to defend herself if necessary when she realized that the banging was coming from her door. She stumbled out of her bed, rushing out to the hallway. A millions of thoughts crossed her mind before she reached the window, looking outside to see who it was knocking on the door with such force.

When she opened the door she was calm, her mask of confidence completely in place. "Lalah," she said, greeting the woman, "to what do I owe this pleasant visit?"

"There've been some new developments," Lalah said, quick and without any hesitation. "The execution that you've been expecting will be put on hold for a while." There was something in the way Lalah's breaths were short, her eyes too focused, that made Owen realize that something was very, very wrong. "Meanwhile," Lalah continued, "you've got to stay in this house or there'll be consequences."

Lalah whirled around, departing in a fast pace without any other word. Owen rushed after her, light streaming out onto the grass from the lamp showing in the open door in her house, barefoot. "Hey, lady! Chill! What's going on?"

Lalah didn't turn around to look at her. Her voice was colder than ice when she said, "Go back, Owen."

"You make me go back!" Owen was now just trailing slightly behind. "I thought you and I had a plan! A really good one to make Ben put the execution on hold. What – what's happening?"

"If you want some answers go see Claret 'cause I sure as hell ain't givin' them."

Owen stopped, her feet hurting as she watched Lalah walk away into the dark, avoiding the light from the lampposts. "I thought you said I wasn't allowed to leave the house!"

**. . . .**

The door creaked when she opened it, as everything in the house; there her smooth quiet entrance went. "Hey, Dad," she said a little embarrassed.

He was sitting on a dark brown armchair, looking very modern in contrast to the unstable bookcases and the cracked wall behind him. He stood up and but the book back in the shelf.

"What were you reading?" Lalah asked and started taking steps forward.

"_Watership Down_, it's a very good book. You will probably read it in school soon."He turned around and smiled warmly, but it didn't quite meet his eyes.

"Maybe."

"I'm a bit surprised." He didn't look it. "You've been refusing to speak for days. Usually you cannot stop talking."

Lalah tilted her head to the side. "Dad." She walked up to him. "I've been thinking, a lot. And... I want to learn."

"What is it you want to learn?" her dad asked, but they both knew he knew what.

"I want to join the family business."

**. . . .**

Lalah grabbed the rifle from the wall, turning around to face the people in the room. She raised an eyebrow. "So?"

"That man, James Ford, is arriving through the tunnels," Jim said quickly, glancing at Garrett who came in through the doors. "If McQueen was telling the truth," he continued under his breath.

"Which tunnels?" Lalah asked, ignoring the last comment.

"Love, how many tunnels do ya think lead into here?" Vincent said, sounding exasperated. Lalah knew why, there was an entrance to the tunnels in one of the houses.

"Jim, I trust you know a way into Garret's house," Lalah said. Jim didn't even try to deny it, nodding eagerly. Garrett threw him an angry look but didn't say anything about it. "Vince, Diane, you go with him." The two of them nodded, Diane looked a little but put off at being ordered, but still she wasn't fighting it. She's been acting more weird than angry after Janna's attack, her brother's death and Florence Bluth's escape. "Shreyans?"

Shreyans looked up from the desk, like he hadn't been listening at all to the conversation until this moment. Lalah simply rolled her eyes at his act. "You are in charge of communication. Got no time to catch up so you're gonna do that for us."

"Like always," Shreyans muttered. Lalah knew the man had been a soldier before the island, and there was no doubt that the man was smart. But he was still new in her eyes, new and untrained. No matter what Mary Jane said. No matter how much Shreyans complained.

"Get going then!" Lalah barked, and Jim, Vince and Diane left.

Lalah held out a rifle for Garrett to take. He shook his head and Lalah sighed. "Didn't think so."

"You've been a long time here," Lalah said while checking to see if she had enough ammunition. "Yeah? Tell me, Garrett. Where's that other tunnel located?"

"Follow me," Garrett said.

**. . . .**

The blasting music got a little quieter when the door slammed closed. A body was pushed up against it. The colourful poster featuring a movie neither of them had seen crinkled up as the kisses between the two girls became more heated.

They stumbled over to one of the two beds in the room, falling in a tangles mess. They laughed. Downstairs an even louder song was playing, drunken shouts could be heard.

One of the girls pulled away from the kiss, breathless, panting slightly, looking up and into the other girl's eyes. "I think..."

"What?"

"...I love you."

Downstairs there was a loud crash, claps almost drowning the music.

The lights turned on, and Lalah pulled back, throwing her legs over at the side so she was turning away from the girl. "Um... really?"

"Yeah," the other girl mumbled, pulling away her red curly hair from her face as she also sat up, moving closer to Lalah on the bed.

"I mean... really, Zooey? We're graduating soon, you're going to study at Stanford and – and I'm..."

"Right.," Zooey muttered. "Excuse my display of affection. It's just – I just wanted to tell you –"

"It's gettin' late I should go," Lalah said before she could continue.

"It's eleven o'clock," Zooey said weakly.

"Yeah, but, lots of... things to do," Lalah shrugged and stood up, not even glancing back at Zooey as she made her way over to the door, smoothing down her white shirt as she did so, "y'know."

She opened the door and music flooded in. She didn't close it behind her, and Zooey saw her practically flee down the stairs.

"That's quite the rejection," she sighed to herself, burying her head in the pillow.

Lalah rushed past the people at the party, making vague excuses as to why to leave to her friends and stepped out in the still hot night.

She had caught a ride with Zooey there, and she wasn't up to calling her parents and explain why she left early, and her siblings were working a job Canada, so she decided to walk home. It would be good exercise.

It was when she'd walked two blocks away that she noticed that the man walking behind her was following her. She started to stay out of the light from the lampposts, and she slowed her pace instead of starting to run.

She rounded a corner.

The man frowned, quickening his pace as he followed after her.

Suddenly he was pulled forward and thrown against the wall. The gun was pressing against his forehead and it took him a time to see clearly who his attacker was.

"Lalah," he said, sounding more out of breath than scared, "my name is Rhys Beard."

"Why would I care about your name?" Lalah whispered. The man was bigger than her, taller, and Lalah was seventeen, but she was far stronger than him and kept him in place. Not that he was trying to escape.

A woman was walking her dog on the opposite street, she looked over to them, but she couldn't see the gun nor understood what it was about so she walked on her way.

"I'm here to talk to you about a job."

"What makes you think –"

"Your family business? We know of you mother and father, Nia and Enu are very talented. But very expensive to hire."

Lalah let go of him, but she was still pointing the small gun at him. He wondered where she'd hidden it.

"I don't accept jobs from people who stalk you through the dark," she snapped, "but thanks."

"It was a test. And from what I've heard about you – this would be your first." He fixed his tie, making Lalah glower at him. He took up the suitcase he'd dropped on the ground.

"Don't open that!"

He did, and showed her what it contained – a file. "Take a look at it. My number's inside. And we can discuss the details later. You can check up on me with your contacts if you like – but, well, you will find mostly complaints that we're focusing on too small crimes, according to them of course."

Lalah looked from the file to him, and with a resigned sigh she took it. She let her other hand with the gun fall to her side. "Doesn't mean I'll take it," she muttered under her breath, louder she said, "I know this deal – following me – is just to make me feel flattered."

"Well, you sure are special," he said while she walked away.

It was a gray day. Lalah's phone vibrated with another message from Zooey that she ignored as she sat down by the small table by the window. It'd been a week since that party. She had a newspaper in her hand, and a smile spread on her face when she read the headlines. She put the paper down and got up to make herself breakfast, turning on the radio.

She was pouring hot coffee into her yellow cup when the doorbell rang. The coffee forgotten, she hurried to answer it.

"Hi, little sis!" Amara hugged her quickly, stomping into the apartment with her shoes on. "Mom and dad working?"

She flopped down on the chair Lalah had been sitting earlier on.

"Yeah, nice to see you too," Lalah replied, just a hint of sarcasm as she said it.

"Oh, don't be mad 'cause you had to stay at home, bored out of your mind. I'm here now." She picked up the newspaper, taking a sip from Lalah's cup of coffee.

Lalah rolled her eyes.

"Oh my god, Lalah." Amara tugged at her sleeve and forced her to sit down beside her. "Don't you go to school?"

Lalah stared at her. "I'm seventeen. Yes, i go to school."

"Yeah, but like – this teacher's died! In a car crash. One death – his. Wasn't he the one everybody thought fooled around with his students? Not thinking anyone's gonna miss him. But so close to your graduation..."

Lalah stood up. "Huh, yeah. Poor thing, sunny day, alone in the car, sun must've blinded him."

Lalah walked out of the kitchen, leaving Amara staring after her with a doubtful look on her face.

**. . . .**

"Shreyans, good boy!" Jim said into the walkie-talkie, quite happily for the situation. Jim had never liked the tunnels. It felt wrong to be down there. It was like he didn't belong there, he hadn't been on the island for years and years, he wasn't a part of its history. He looked worriedly at Diane holding a gun and torchlight.

He heard a grunt at the other end of the line.

"Wow, don't talk any louder. You'll hurt my hearing, Shreyans. You see where we are?"

"_Yeah. Though not exceptionally well. Garrett and Lalah are already out of reach_."

"They'll be all right. Nothing scarier than meeting Lalah in a dark alley."

"_Or Garrett. Especially if you're trying to get into his daughter's_ –"

"If you don't have any new important information," Jim interrupted him hastily. "Work information, we should stop. I bet Diane's trying to kill me with her eyes right..." He turned around, frowning as he couldn't see anything anymore. "Diane?" he called out. He didn't see her or the flashlight.

There was no answer.

Jim hurried to put on the walkie again. "Shreyans! Can you contact Diane? I've lost her. Can you also tell me where I am?" There was no response. "Shreyans?"

All he could see was darkness.

"This is just brilliant," Jim groaned.

**. .**

Eva was sitting on the windowpane. In the horizon, above the trees and houses, the sky was red from the sun. Light streamed through the window and over her dark skin and her bare feet. It was still too early to be awake, but nobody was ever really sleeping.

Except for Felicity of course, who was lying spread out on the sofa, hand hovering above the ground, face tucked into her arm, snoring lightly.

Eva quietly jumped down on the floor. With the floor creaking she padded over to the young doctor. She bent down to the ground, and just snatched the key right below Felicity's curled fingers.

She opened the lock to her own room, that Felicity had closed from inside because Vincent had told her about the nightmares, and in a moment of pity the woman had decided to watch over her in case she woke up screaming.

But Eva hadn't slept, and without any demons to chase away Felicity had closed her eyes.

Eva ran up to the front door, not caring to look over her shoulder, all she could think of was to open it. To breathe.

Outside she saw no one, but she knew that there was always someone watching her, so she snuck between the houses carefully, knowing the blind spots, hoping nobody would see her when she had to walk in the path of the cameras.

Time, was all she needed. Too much, it was.

She stopped in front of a window; she was tall enough to knock on it. But instead she picked up a stone on the ground, and threw it at the glass, shattering it.

"What the hell?" she heard someone shout, a thud from something being knocked over. And an angry faced showed up. "What the hell did you do that for?"

Eva opened her closed fist, taking out a crumpled paper which had been folded and unfolded over and over again.

She walked up to the broken window, and handed the note to the woman.

_Tell me what happened to my mothers._

Owen frowned, and stared at the girl. "Eva?"

**. . **

**Author's Notes **I'm a bit of a discoverer, I discover things, like the fact that school starts soon and I have awesome reviewers. Last thing I already knew.

(Late update? What late update? No. Time travel! This is updated earlier than expected!)

Namaste.


	49. Bright Hope, Part 1

_A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,_  
_Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would control,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
_For that bright hope at last  
_And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 41, Bright Hope, Part 1**

. .

This was not good. This was so not good. Some people would assume that Jim Al wouldn't lose his head in a dire situation. Some people would say he was too good for that – that he was one of Ben's best. But the thing was – he wasn't. He wasn't a hunter like Garrett. He wasn't as good with guns as Lalah. And he wasn't cold blooded like Diane. He had been a biologist. But he'd arrived at the island and he'd gotten his job and he had to stick with it because really, how could anyone question their leader?

Diane was gone. It was dark. The radio was dead.

He wasn't running, not yet.

**. . . .**

Beethoven's fifth symphony was playing when Jim first found his mother passed out on the floor.

Every time his mother fell asleep, when eating dinner, reading or when she was just going to close her eyes for a second when they were in a car, he heard the music there, back in his head, haunting him.

He once jokingly said to a friend it was his theme song, since it followed him through his life.

Jim had bad nightmares. (It seemed like sleeping disorders ran in the family.) It started when he was a teenager, and his mom was very confused. It wasn't as usual as it was for kids – waking up screaming, sweaty, terrified – when you were that old. Not being able to remember where he was, who his mother was, being trapped inside the dream, trying his hardest to wake up – that, that wasn't usual.

But Jim dealt with it, just as his mother did.

When he now woke up, sitting up in bed before falling down on his pillow, he could hear the tones of the symphony ring in his ears.

After he'd calmed down, he did his usual morning ritual, which involved getting dressed and skipping the whole shower/shaving part to eat breakfast.

He would've done this, if he hadn't seen his mail first.

There was a handwritten letter in his mail.

There was a _handwritten _letter in his mail.

All right, Jim wasn't the most up to tech guy but he did think that handwritten letter were extinct.

Who wrote letters in this age? Well, except from his mother. She for some reason liked to send people letters, she got answers all the time too even though nobody could read her horrid handwriting. (Jim's handwriting was better, really… at least he could read his own. His mom couldn't!)

He missed her. He shouldn't have moved. All right, he hadn't moved by choice. She and his friends had made a pact and kicked him out.

Jim opened the letter immediately as he went to sit in the only sofa in his apartment, curiosity getting the better of him. He read the first two lines, and froze in his tracks.

He immediately ripped it in two, not caring to read the rest, not before he'd even had the chance to think. He crumpled it into a ball and threw it out the open window.

He stared at where the letter had been thrown.

He swallowed.

And he rushed for the door – the elevator was broken as usual – and almost flew down the stairs. He looked around to see where the letter had landed, and saw Kaitlin, a thirteen year old girl with blue hair that used to play "music" all night in the apartment below him.

"That's mine!" he shouted, when he saw that she was unfolding the letter, trying to piece the two parts together. "Mine! The letter!"

"What is this?" the girl asked, furrowing her brow, completely ignoring his attempts at retrieving the letter from her. "Is this some kind of blackmail?" She looked at him with big pale blue eyes. "Have you gotten job offer from the mafia?"

He took the chance and snatched it out of her hands. "No."

"But it's to you, isn't it? Or…" Her eyes, if possible, got even bigger. "Did you write this? You should just tell the poor guy where his dad is! You can't blackmail people! Or join the mafia! I got a cell phone. I'm not afraid to use it!"

"You should use it to hit yourself over the head with," Jim muttered. Louder, he said, "It's a prank. From a friend. And really, you should mind your own business. Didn't your parents teach you anything? Kids these days."

"You're like what, four years older than me?"

Jim walked away from her. "Good at math too."

He stopped outside the entrance to the apartment complex, reading the letter completely now. At the end he sighed deeply, looking up at the sky, mouthing 'seriously?'

He kept the letter.

**. . . .**

"You're Eva," Owen said to the girl outside the window. They stared at each other.

Owen's mouth opened and closed, until she shouted, "Go away! You can't be here. Go!"

The girl reached for her but Owen slapped her hand away. "Go!" she repeated. She fumbled after the phone on her nightstand. She should contact someone, tell them the girl – Eva – was there.

Suddenly Owen saw that Eva's small hands were curled around the windowpane, the shards of glasses cut into her skin, and she was biting her lip in pain as she climbed over.

"You can't…" Owen protested, her eyes roaming after a surveillance camera, for someone to barge in and stop what was happening.

Eva landed on the floor with a thud, and she assembled herself quickly. There were drops of red blood on the floor.

"Get away from me!" Owen snapped, taking a step back. The girl didn't answer, but ominously walked towards her. "Did a cat bite off your tongue?" Owen tried to sound threatening, but she was stumbling over her own feet as she tried to get away from her, the small bloody hands, the accusing eyes. Everything.

She dropped the note on the floor. The girl picked it up, holding it up to her, demanding an answer. _Tell me what happened to my mothers._

"Sorry, girl. I don't know your mothers," Owen lied. "Why don't you go home before security gets here? They're watching us right now!" Owen thought they were at least, she hoped they were. She straightened her back.

Owen was cornered; the girl was almost the same height as she. She was just staring, holding the note in her hand, and suddenly she didn't look so threatening at all. She looked broken, kind of like Claire, longing after someone they'd loved and lost.

Owen thought of Lalah's face when she'd replaced her in that cell, after Owen had told her that her family was dead.

"You're taller than your mother," she said all of the sudden, sounding out of breath, like the fact was a wonder. It made the girl's shoulders tense, but her stern face turned soft. Now she looked more like a lost little kid than ever.

Eva pushed the note into Owen's hand. The girl looked sad, but she wasn't crying.

Owen noticed that she herself was.

"They're gone," she whispered. "Whatever that was before this island, is no more. So go away before they hurt you. Okay? I can't take care of you. You're alone now. Leave."

Eva backed away. Owen could hear voices coming from outside, people were waking up, someone was gonna walk past her house and they were going to see the window and they were going to know something was wrong.

Eva wasn't worrying about that, not in the way she fell down to her knees in front of Owen's nightstand, looking through the drawers until she found a pen. She scribbled down something on the note. She threw it at Owen without even looking at her.

Owen picked it up. _Liar_, she read.

"Did they do something to your voice?" Owen asked, while wondering why it was taking so long for Lalah, anyone, to get to her. They were watching, weren't they? "Know what? Doesn't matter. This is a break-in. And you need to get out of here."

She walked right up to the girl, grabbed her arms and forced her up to her feet. "Let's get you out of here."

Eva wriggled herself out of Owen's grip. She kicked her leg and Owen stumbled back, more in surprise than anything else. Eva grabbed the lamp, hesitating, then she threw it the hardest she could at the floor.

There was a crack in the light bulb, but nothing else broke. They both stared at each other.

"Owen?" she saw a face outside the window, she heard voices calling, they'd come now. They were going to take Eva away. Eva knew that too, and she fell, like her spine was gone and her limbs didn't work and she became a helpless mess on the floor, shaking but no tears falling.

Owen, she just watched.

**. .**

Boone had returned to the cell a while ago. Bonnie was sleeping on the floor in the corner, eyes fluttering slightly. Brian had draped a blanket over her that Claret had brought to them together with a plate of food; she'd looked really upset when she came in, only looking at Bonnie. She'd been mumbling also.

The food was eaten (Brian doubted it was actually food, but Boone had seemed to like the weird things). Boone was just about to wake Bonnie up when Brian put a hand on his arm. "Don't."

"Why not?" Boone argued, too loud for Brian's liking.

Brian looked from Bonnie to Brian, this was it. He had to do it now. She'd been asleep long enough.

"I know, Boone" Brian said.

Boone frowned in confusion. "Know what?"

"I know you're with them," Brian muttered darkly and Boone's eyes widened. "When I brought you to them – something happened, right? So now you're with them. I don't know why you didn't tell me… kept up this act. But now…"

"Brian –"

"I want in. I want to be on your side. It's not 'cause being in a cell and getting beat you all the time is hard, it's because they –" He pointed at the door "– they've already won, man. I got it now."

Boone stared at Brian in silence.

"Really?" he asked.

"Really."

Boone then looked straight at the camera, and he must've done some kind of signal. Because his brow furrowed, and he muttered: "Why aren't they coming?"

"Uh… just stay put." He turned to Brian. "And don't say anything to Bonnie."

They didn't know that she was already awake.

Bonnie opened her eyes.

Before anyone of them said anything, she grabbed the plate, throwing it at Boone. Brian was too shocked to react.

Boone stumbled backwards at the hit. The plate broke into pieces leaving a trail of blood running down Boone's face.

Bonnie grabbed a shard of the plate to attack Boone with like a knife. She lashed out wildly.

Brian regained control of himself and tired to get her off him. He was still too weak, and she threw him off easily. She hit him over the head, and that was it.

**. . **

Jim didn't call for Diane again. He had a theory on why she was gone. It wasn't the theory that she's gotten bored and wandered off on her own. But he wished it was that one. He sighed.

He couldn't see his feet. He fumbled in his pockets after a tiny flashlight. He put it on; it was almost useless, only giving light in one small direct stream. He couldn't see more than three feet in front of him.

He needed to focus. Okay, the radio was dead. That meant that somehow their communication system was down. That meant that something had gone wrong with Shreyans since he was their link. He wished they'd brought a normal walkie-talkie instead.

He couldn't think of what could've been – he needed to think about now. This also meant that Shreyans – if he was conscious – must be either working on the problem or alarming Ben about what's happened. Either way Jim would get reinforcements soon.

Diane had disappeared right behind him. And he hadn't heard a thing. He'd been occupied with talking to Shreyans, and soon after he'd discovered that Diane was gone Shreyans had stopped talking too. Their enemies were synchronized. But how could they have anybody on the inside? They'd caught Bonnie. Claire was under constant watch. Jack wasn't going to do anything to anybody anytime soon. And Maddy… was gone, he reminded himself. She was gone.

He had the gun in his hand, which was good, because if they'd taken Diane they would sure be coming after him too. But he had a small advantage – he knew the tunnels. Not good, but probably better than them.

He needed to go back. It was better if they blocked the entrance instead of going in and hunting them. Backing, turning right, there had been a slope – there it was. There were no hieroglyphs in this corridor. There had been on the way in. Take a deep breath, he told himself, check to see if there are enough bullets, listen.

**. . . . **

His mother lived in one of those rows of identical houses. She'd tried to make the place unique in her own way, by hanging colorful signs on the door, re-arranging the garden with lilies instead of roses but she had been forced to keep the walls red just like the others.

He rang the doorbell; he'd called to make sure she was awake before he'd left. So he was hoping she would answer the door.

"Jimmy!" His mother smiled, her fingers were covered in paint, but she still hugged him the best she could while avoiding getting any on his clothes. She looked to see if he had any bags with him, seeing he didn't, she invited him in.

He tried to call the house his mom's, but it would always be theirs. There by the fireplace he'd fallen and sprained his ankle – a thing only Jim could achieve – and though he'd been crying (more of shock than pain) and his mother had almost fainted in shock he felt that that memory was something that marked the place as his.

"Jim?"

"What?" He realized that she'd been speaking to him, something about the painting she was working on. "Um…"

Her smile fell. And then she noticed he was holding something a tight grip. "What's that?"

Jim unfolded the letter he'd taped together again, and gave it to her. He felt cold as she read it, slowly sinking down on the sofa, leaving smudges of paint on it.

"Jim, what is this?" she asked sternly.

Jim sat down on the other end of the couch, not looking at her, but at a point on the floor. "I want you to tell me about my father, Mom. I think it's my time to ask questions now, don't you?"

"He was nice," his mom said after a moment of silence.

Jim looked up. "_Nice?_ That's what you got to tell about him?"

"What we did, Jim… We weren't in love. He was a very sad man, broken. I wanted to fix him. But he didn't want to be fixed."

"Is that just another meaning for one-night stand?"

"No…" His mom bit her lip. "Yes. It was easier for you to make up something yourself, glorify him. You always had a wondrous imagination."

"Does he know, like, that I even exist?"

"Yes." His mom now looked close to tears. "Yes he does."

"And he… he doesn't wanna see me?" Why did his voice get high-pitched, _why?_

"Yes, he does. He wanted to see you very much, but… Jim. When I said he was broken I meant it. He was a wreck. I couldn't have him near you in the state he was in."

"And it never hit you he could have changed? Sometimes people go through phases… like you and that time you thought you were going to do Impressionism."

"Don't talk about that," she muttered. "Yes. I believe people can change. But by the time I realized that… He was gone. I couldn't find him. He said he would come back, and see you, but he didn't."

Jim stood up, but not before taking the letter our of his mother's hands.

"Jim…" his mom said, "are you going? To meet him?"

Jim nodded. "It's… it's a job offer too. Kind of creepy. Hey, like to work for us? By the way we have your dad."

She looked down, ignoring his sarcastic comment. "I'm glad. I – I think I have a picture of him, actually. Somewhere. I'm just gonna go and get it…" She rushed out of the room.

Jim sat on the couch, cracking his knuckles until his mom returned. She gave him the picture.

He looked down at the man in the photograph for just a few seconds before he looked away.

"I'm sorry," his mom said, "I never thought this…"

"…Would happen;" Jim finished for her. But it did, it did happen. And his mom was right; Jim did have a wondrous imagination. And as always, the things he imagined up were amazing and unbelievable and were always crushed to pieces, but this time, he forgot.

**. . . .**

Owen's feet were up on the table, and Vincent, seeing Owen's little care for her home did the same. She knew they had little time, that the Others were extremely busy doing Otherly things.

Naturally, that meant Owen drew out on the time.

"You sure you don't want any tea?" She faked a smile.

"I wish for you to tell me what happened when Eva arrived," Vincent said for the eight time.

"Oh, she was just lovely," Owen said.

"How so?"

Owen stood up, running her fingers through her damp hair. She needed a shower. "I think I'll make myself some tea, actually."

She'd just taken a step when there was a hand on her arm, roughly pulling her down. She flopped back down on the couch again, whining when Vincent didn't release his grip. "Listen to me, sweetheart. You have no idea what's going on, and I really need to know every single detail of what happened between you and Eva. If you won't tell me, well – there are people who say violence is the answer."

"Not so happy-go-lucky, are you?"

He released his grip, leaning back again. "Not now. Too stressed, you see. Did she break the window?"

"Yeah, she did." Owen wondered to herself what was happening, Lalah had also been acing weird before. Something was going down. She cleared her throat and went on, "She then just climbed in like something from _The Ring_. She really has a creepy stare, that girl, Eva. Like soul-staring stuff, scary. So she just walks around and of course as the fine citizen I am – I tell her to go back to… anyway, she sort of broke down, but not before she threw a freaking lamp at the floor."

Owen looked up, expecting some sort of reaction from the man, disappointment, maybe. Maybe he would feel horror because a little teenage girl had escaped their clutches so easily.

Vincent chuckled. "Finally."

Owen gaped at him; it hadn't been the reaction she'd been expecting. "Excuse me? Didn't you hear what I just –"

"Said? You do talk a lot, Chauncey. Many are gonna think this is a bad thing, what with her escaping rushing into your house and all that, but for me – as a person who has been trying to take care of her – this is good news. She's finally showin' some feelings, anger, sadness, betrayal. She's still not talking… but, it's better than just nothing, ain't it?"

"I wouldn't know," Owen said sternly, "I'm too busy worrying about sleeping at night to think about how she's feeling."

"Actually," Vincent said, not really hearing anything Owen had said, "this is better than good. This – this is an opportunity. For you and for her, love –"

Owen cringed at the nickname.

"– I think you and Eva should spend much more time together."

"W-what?"

**. .**

"Have you seen Wendy?" Margo asked Hurley, who was making breakfast for himself and Libby.

Hurley shook his head. "Nope. Not since yesterday." He looked up, eyes widening. "You don't think…"

"No, no, I'm just… looking." Margo walked away from him, a frown on her face. She saw the freighter folk, Janna, Milou, Fred, Miles and to her surprise Andrea, speak in hushed voices by the trees, well, until Fled exclaimed something very loudly.

She wanted to hear what they were talking about, but first she wanted to see Wendy and ask her if she wanted to have breakfast with her. It had to look kind of pathetic, how she was running around.

She turned around and saw Zidler at the outskirts of the camp, talking to a tree Fred had practically lived by for a while.

Wait, talking to a tree?

She blinked, but it still looked like Zidler was explaining something to the palm tree. She picked up her pace, but slowed down when she got closer to him.

"And I just wanted to say," Zidler said to the tree, "that really we must put our differences aside –"

"Yo!" Margo yelled in an almost perfect imitation of Owen.

Zidler jumped, whirling around. "Jesus!"

"Do I look like Jesus?" Margo snapped, now offended.

"No, I didn't – I…" Zidler looked flabbergasted.

"It's okay." Margo smiled. Her hormones changed quickly, not that she herself noticed. "By the way, have you seen Wendy anywhere?"

Zidler turned pale. "Um, uh… err."

"What is it?" Margo asked warily.

"Well… she's kind of… left," Zidler said in a very low voice.

"Left?" Margo shouted. "Left where? Why?"

"Well… she… uh, she said she wanted to get out of it all. And then I screamed at her to stay –"

"You screamed at her?" Margo looked horrified. "Don't you – you – Zidler!"

"She screamed at me first!" Zidler defended himself. "And she was… she was saying all these crazy things! I didn't want her to leave!"

"So you told her to go because you didn't want her to go?" Margo raised her arms into the air. "Everything makes perfect sense!"

"Wendy's crazy!" Zidler spat.

"We've all been there!" she yelled back. She crossed her arms. "And since we are both her friends, it's your duty to go after her."

"Mine?" Zidler sputtered. "What? That doesn't make any sense!"

"Libby's forbidden me from exhausting myself;" she told him. "And since you were the one who chased her away…" Margo waved at the forest.

"And what if I don't go?"

Margo raised her eyebrows.

"Brilliant," Zidler muttered.

He didn't tell her that he had planned to go after Wendy anyway.

**. .**

"So, let me get this straight," Milou said to Fred, "_you_ want to go and place the antennas out?"

"It's not just to place them. We all have to activate them on at the same time! At the _exact_ same time. We don't know how long they'll last," Fred said. "And since I have done all the work, and know this the best… then…"

"Absolutely not," Milou said. "You won't be safe there. Janna and I'll go. And you stay here at the beach."

"What about me?" asked Miles.

"You stay here and watch over Fred," said Milou.

"Fantastic," Fred muttered.

Miles shook his head like he couldn't believe what she was saying. "You mean I will babysit him?"

"Hey!" Fred cried out.

"Everybody, just calm down!" Andrea shouted. Despite saying at first that she wanted nothing to do with the Freighter folk, she was now the one in charge. Somehow she just couldn't get out of it. And as she realized now, she needed to be around them. "This is how this goes: Milou, Janna _and_ I will venture out in the jungle. Miles, Fred, stay here and with the help of Desmond you rig your antenna."

"Can you count?" Milou asked Andrea seriously.

"Yeah, I can," Andrea said, "I can't dispose of anybody here on this beach. I alone will be enough."

"So now _you _will have a babysitter," Miles said in glee to Milou.

**. .**

"You stay quiet, Sheena," Sawyer whispered to the Other woman. He had a hand clasped over her mouth, a gun pressed into her back. Her hands were twisted around her back, tied together by a fragile rope.

Flor looked a little hesitant, eyes flickering worriedly from Sawyer to the woman that she vaguely recognized from her time with the Others.

"Go," Sawyer growled. He knew what was going through her head right now, but the woman was smaller than he was and even if she got a hold of that weapon he could defend himself.

Flor disappeared into the dark of the tunnels; Sawyer hoped she knew the way. He turned off the flashlight. All that could be heard was the woman struggling slightly and their breathing.

He counted to two minutes, and then he lightly released his hold over her mouth. She cried out before he slammed the gun over her head, and she fell into a helpless heap on the ground.

He had the weapon ready. Her scream had been loud. He hoped it'd been loud enough to be heard.

Soon he heard the sound of footsteps approaching them, a flickering light just out of the corner of his eye.

Sawyer was hidden in the shadows, the light didn't reach him and he could easily see the young man, weapon ready, head turning, coming their way.

The situation was perfect. But everything could still go wrong. He held his breath – he had to wait for the right moment. The man was still too far away, and his pace was slowing down.

Sawyer carefully took a step forward. Something creaked. And the man halted abruptly, now holding out his flashlight. The light would find Sawyer at any second –

He didn't have a choice. He burst out of his hiding place. The element of surprise meant everything now. He kicked the gun out of the man's hands, tried to hit him with his own but the man backed away, sending Sawyer who'd used his full strength for the blow, flying against the wall.

Sawyer stumbled on his feet. The man swung out with his foot and he fell to the ground, tasting dirt in his mouth. "Son of a…" was all he got out before he fumbled after the gun he'd dropped, getting the flashlight instead. He rolled around and came face to face with a gun.

"Where's Diane?" the man shouted. He didn't look angry, he was breathing hard and he looked –

He looked scared.

Sawyer couldn't help the smirk on his face. Diane was just lying a few feet away from him, and he didn't see her.

Sawyer could smell his breath when he leaned forward, gun tilting to the side. Now, there was some annoyance in the man's voice, "Where's –"

Sawyer threw his head forward, smashing it against the man's skull. It hurt like hell, and he couldn't see for a few seconds, but he had been awaiting it – the guy hadn't. The gun slipped out of the man's hands and Sawyer snatched it from him. As he saw the other gun lying on the ground he picked it up too.

The man looked up, saw the two weapons in Sawyer's hand and groaned, wiping off blood of his lip, but there was much more pouring out of his nose.

"I think I'll keep you," Sawyer said, making the guy's eyes go wide.

Sawyer, he just smirked.

**. .**

Andrea announced to the survivors the plan. She cleared it out, and to everyone's surprise she said triangulation right. After having told everyone about it, she started to walk towards Kim, who was barely standing on crutches.

Kim didn't even try to get away, and Andrea stopped in front of her.

"I'm going with them, Kim. I want to stay here, make sure everyone's okay – but I'm not a leader." Despite the fact that she was, Kim thought. "So not a leader," Andrea continued. "And who can I trust to watch over the freighter people better than I?"

Kim stared at her. There were so many things she wanted to shout at her, but it would do no good.

"Okay," she said in a low voice instead. "Be safe. And Andy – when you come back," she bit her lip, "things will have changed, a lot."

"Everything's always changing," said Andrea.

They both laughed nervously at her ominous tone.

"Bye." Kim kissed Andrea on the cheek. Andrea smiled, almost shyly, when she walked away.

Kim then wondered what had made Andrea smile shyly, because Andrea didn't smile shyly. And it'd been a long time since she'd faked a smile, and really, with everything that was going on it was strange that she got hung up on that.

She looked at Fox's shelter – the one they'd rebuilt together. They hadn't even bothered to build another one for Kim.

And she made her decision.

**. .**

Andrea walked away from Kim with a heavy heart. She saw Lori and Desmond approaching her, and she cocked her head at the jungle, hoping they would follow her. They did, and soon they were far away from the chaos of the camp.

She didn't have much time to explain everything so she threw herself right into it. "This is the best chance to learn anything. I go with them, hear what they have to say and you two stay here and try to get so much information as you can."

"You shouldn't go alone," Lori said. "I get these really bad vibes from that Janna woman, and Milou's just too serious for my liking."

"I can't trust to bring anybody else with me," Andrea said honestly. "We don't have time to argue."

"Aye, she's right, sis," Desmond said. "Something's fishy about them, they say Penny sent them. Yet they seem to care nothing about her sister, me or you." He turned to Andrea. "Perhaps we should just ask them."

They all laughed at the simple idea.

Andrea was the last one to get ready to leave. Janna was staring at her with a small frown on her face, and Milou was busy reminding Miles and Fred that it was exactly at eight o'clock they were going to put their antennas on.

"We _know_," Miles said through his teeth. "Not everybody had to retake third grade like you."

Milou looked completely taken aback.

"Third grade?" Fred looked at Miles.

"You wouldn't believe what that chick Taylor at the freighter knows about people," Miles explained.

Milou didn't say goodbye to either of them. Andrea chuckled, and Janna didn't look as cold as before.

"Let's go then."

Desmond waved goodbye, Lori made thumbs up and Andrea smiled as they left into the jungle.

**. .**

Fox had been in the jungle, picking fruit, so when he returned, back aching, (not so much fruit since he dropped it all down a cliff), he was looking to rest.

But when he stepped inside his shelter, he saw Kim standing there with two bags.

"I'm moving out."

Fox stared. Kim winced a little, she was still hurt. His first reaction was to ask her when she moved in. But then he understood what she really was saying.

"Um…" It would sound pathetic for Fox to ask why. "Why?" So naturally he did just that.

"Because I don't know you." She bit her lip, looking like she wanted to say something more, explain herself.

She grabbed one of her crutches. She had trouble standing up and Fox wanted to help her – but he didn't think she would want that. She hung one of the bags over her shoulder and the other one in her other hand.

She started to make her way over to him, to the exit, when she stopped right beside him. "Why won't you say something? I know you're more than this… braver."

Fox turned his head to the side, looking at her long black hair. "I – I thought you said you didn't know me."

"Okay," Kim whispered and halted away from him.

Fox stood there, looking around at the shelter, how empty it looked now, without Kim's spirit – energy lifting it up. But maybe that had gotten destroyed when the cave broke in on both of them.

"Dude, are you okay?"

Fox turned around and saw Hurley. In the distance he saw Libby with an arm over Kim's shoulders as they walked away.

"Uh, yeah." Fox swallowed.

"Huh, is she upset over Andrea leaving?" Hurley gestured at Kim and Libby.

"L-leaving?"

"Yeah, she, Milou and that girl with all the scars took off into the jungle to tri-tri-lug… that signal. Didn't you know?"

Fox actually smiled to himself. It had lasted long. "What if I told you, Hurley. That I – I know how we can get rescued off this island?"

"What?"

"I know what's really blocking the signal."

**. .**

Flor was panting heavily, she didn't have much light and soon she would have to put it out. She was sweating hard, hair plastered against her head and hands leaving damp spots on the map. She folded it and put it in her pocket. She was glad she was out of that dress now.

She turned off the light and left the flashlight by one of the tunnel's walls. She wouldn't need it anymore. Her vest's pocket was weighing down against her heart that was beating fast.

She saw the exit; there was a stream of light by it. But it wasn't her exit. She turned right and picked up her pace until she was almost running.

Long minutes went, feeling longer as her heart beat so hard. When she reached a wall with hieroglyphs again, she tried to count her steps. There it was. The hidden one – she hoped. It all would be easier if she wasn't discovered right away.

She raised her foot, feeling a little ridiculous, when she realized the wall was already broken. It was old wood, painted to look like rocks, she realized. Sawyer had been right; everything about the Others was just a big theater act.

She took a deep breath and climbed over all the rubble. It was dark. But now the walls were of stone, painted gray, and there was a light in the roof that flickered.

This was a hard part; Flor now had no idea where she was, because this place wasn't mapped out.

She tucked her hair behind her ears. Now, time to see if she had everything she needed. Device? Still in her pocket. Vest? Still covering up everything it needed.

She made her way over the dirty floor. She almost tripped, having to steady herself against the wall. She saw a door at the end of the corridor.

How amazing would it be if Eva was right behind that door?

She opened it, and saw that the lock on the other side had been destroyed. She wondered who'd entered the tunnels this way.

There were no guards positioned outside. And the corridor led out to another corridor. It was a maze.

She passed a blue door, looking around she couldn't see anybody, when she suddenly heard voices. She flattened herself against the wall, not that it would do any good when they rounded the corner.

"Really? Owen Chauncey?" woman voice said doubtingly. "Don't you think…"

"Felicity," a warm voice said, "you were the one to let her go."

"I'm never gonna live this down, am I, Vince?" the woman replied.

"Well, Chauncey ain't ever gonna let you forget if she finds out it was you who allowed the girl to go."

Flor bit her lip. The steps were getting closer. Soon they would see her.

To make it easier, she stepped right out from her hiding place.

She heard a shriek and saw that the woman had taken a step back in surprise. The man had his gun drawn at her.

"Bluth?" he gasped.

Flor knew how it had to look. Her, there, in _their_ home, in _their_ community. She smiled at the mental image. And imagined herself as Sawyer, if he was the one doing this.

She knelt down at the show of the man's hands. "Take me to your leader."

**. .**

They tied her down to the chair, ruthlessly, not caring a bit if they hurt her or not. Flor winced, looking up at all the people pointing their weapons at her. This time there would be no trials. They could've shot her the second they saw her, but they were curious – they wanted to know why she just came to them willingly.

Bloodlust and curiosity, she wondered which was the strongest.

Someone sat down at the opposite end of the table. Flor recognized her, the blonde hair, cold eyes – it was Juliet. They sent her advocate.

Flor tried her hardest to look brave, but a shiver ran up her spine when she looked into Juliet's eyes.

"Hello," Juliet said.

"You wonder why I'm here," Flor said simply.

"Yes," Juliet responded.

Flor had been in a similar situation before. But then she'd been sitting down in a gray empty room, without any means to defend herself. And at that time Juliet had been on her side. This time Juliet was staring at her like she hated her more than anything in the world.

Now, Flor at least had a goal to keep her going.

"I wanted to talk to your leader," she said. "I will tell Benjamin Linus everything. If you will let him see me."

**. . **

"Man, I'm into all sort of weird stuff, believe me. But blood play has never been a favorite of mine." Jim licked his bloody lips. He was kneeling on the ground. Sawyer was pacing back and forth. "Can I get a tissue or somethin'?"

It was a bit hard for Sawyer to hear what he was saying. "Really, aren't you just a pocket full of sunshine."

"I like you," Jim said, "you're funny; it's a certain way to play the big bad boy with a soft inside. Let me guess – you're here on a brave heroic rescue mission with your own life at stake!"

"Shut up," Sawyer said, but not very strongly. He glanced at the other woman, Diane. She was tied up too, and still unconscious.

"How'd you knock 'em out?" Jim asked, nodding at his and Diane's walkie-talkies. "Who is your super secret mole on the inside?"

"Who said we have anybody on your side?" Sawyer shot back.

"Okay, okay. Touchy," Jim mumbled. He strained weakly against his binds, straightening his back. "So, you're the Ford person, James, right?"

Sawyer stopped. "How'd you guess?"

"I have a full-size poster of you up on the wall," Jim joked. "All brooding staring-into-the-distance bad guy attitude."

"You wanna end up like her?" Sawyer nodded at Diane.

"No…" Jim said slowly.

"Then shut the hell up."

"Or –" Jim suggested "– We can do this true or false thing, say random theories, confirm them or, y'know, not confirm them. 'Cause that's more fun that silence. All right, I'll start. You're here to rescue someone. And um, that somebody is a teenage girl? Did I get that right?"

Sawyer was completely silent.

"Yes!" Jim grinned. But it looked hideous with his broken lips and bruises. "True, confirmed, whatever! I would give myself a pat in the back… but…" He looked at the rope. "Well, your turn."

Sawyer walked right up to him, gun in his hand. Jim knew what he was going to do, and braced himself for the hit that would knock him out.

When they suddenly heard voices.

Sawyer put a finger to his mouth, waving with the gun. Jim got it: make a sound and he would be heading straight to hell.

Sawyer hid in the shadows, but leaned forward. Jim couldn't see anyone, but the voices got louder as they were getting closer.

"Why are we here?" Jim recognized the low voice immediately, it was Garret's. What the hell were they doing in this section of the tunnels? Jim was sure he hadn't gone over to them… but he had been running in the dark, so…

"This is not the path we were supposed to take;" Garrett continued. "This leads directly to…" His voice trailed off. "Lalah?"

"You know the tunnels better than I do. So why don't ya tell me where this goes?" Jim heard Lalah, it sounded like she was trying too hard to sound cheeky.

He didn't know whether he was supposed to be happy or distressed that they were close by them. Garrett and Lalah were both strong in a fight, and they could easily rescue Jim if they could just know where he was. But –

"This leads to a formation of caves close to the west cliff – but that is a forbidden area. I forbade anyone for going there myself, Lalah. The nightmares that people have suffered –"

"People suffer from nightmares because they're lost. You got a goal, old man. Our radio's not working. You got your escape."

"No. I will not do this. Diane and Jim, they need me. I cannot leave –"

"And yet just his morning you were dead set on takin' the sub and leave this place for good. But you changed your mind. And it wasn't for them, or Ben, or even the island. It was for your kid. It was for Maddy. So unless you want me to shoot some sense into you…"

"You are a very calculating woman, Lalah. But –"

"Don't worry 'bout me. After all you've seen me done…"

Silence.

"Goodbye, Lalah."

"Goodbye."

Jim, if he hadn't been tied up at the moment, would've gone after Garrett. Probably screaming and firing bullets wildly at him. Because this had not been their plan to find Maddy, their plan involved the two of them, together, and without Lalah as a deux ex machina for them. And now Jim was held hostage by Sawyer fake-name Ford and not only had Garrett left him, he'd left all of them.

Screw everything.

"Here's the deal," he whispered. Sawyer glared at him, and Jim had only seconds to explain himself before he was shot or knocked out or whatever. "After this, take me with you. I'm not lookin' to infiltrate you or stab you in the back. The kid they were talking about, Maddy, I wanna find her too. I don't care about much else right now. And Lalah's probably coming our way, she's an assassin by the way, and if you're even gonna have a chance at taking her out I have to help you."

Sawyer stared.

"Trust me," Jim said.

He heard Lalah coming their way.

"Get me outta here, and I'll help you – I don't know. Anything," Jim continued, voice rising. The steps became faster. Sawyer looked stressed, sweat breaking on his forehead.

"Come on," Jim whispered.

Sawyer took out a knife, and went to cut up Jim's ropes.

Jim held up his hands, and smiled sheepishly. It'd been really easy to get out of the fragile ropes. A little pretend stretching, pure magic… in the version he would tell Maddy when he saw her.

Sawyer gave him the knife. Jim smiled even bigger. "Just… don't kill her," he said to Sawyer.

Sawyer nodded. And they both readied themselves to attack Lalah.

What they had not expected, was that Lalah was the one attacking them.

Sawyer just barged out, just like when he'd attacked Jim, when a knife whizzed past his head. And another one buried itself in his leg.

Jim grabbed the falling gun before it hit the ground. He fired, aiming for Lalah's arm. Lalah easily dodged the bullet, but when she saw Jim's face. She lost her pace, hesitating with the third knife. He could see her confusion.

"I'm sorry!" He fired a bullet that went into her leg. Her legs buckled under her, but she had a gun of her own too. All hesitation was now gone.

Jim ducked and the bullet flew over his head. Sawyer was groaning on his side, trying to get the second gun out of its holster.

"What the hell, Jim?" Lalah screamed, half-dragging herself across the ground. "What the hell are you doing? Stop it, or I'll shoot him!" She was aiming at Sawyer.

"Then I'll shoot Diane!" Jim shouted back. "And I'm doing this for the very same reason you let Garrett go!"

Lalah looked like she wanted to put a bullet in his head, which she very well could. Jim was actually surprised she hadn't done that yet.

"Shoot her then!" Lalah yelled. "Shoot her! Do it, Jim!"

Jim hesitated. He couldn't do it, but he had to pretend. But the little hesitation was enough for Lalah.

"We don't need her;" Lalah spit out. "She's disposable. Shoot her and prove you're with _them_ now."

"I'm not with anybody! I just want to –"

"Want to what? Betray everybody you know? Fire a bullet at your friend? What'd you think your other friends will say – your family? Alex, Shreyans, Karl, Felicity –"

A shot rang out. But neither Jim nor Lalah had fired.

Sawyer was struggling up against the wall. Diane was bleeding out from a bullet wound in her chest. He had a gun in his hand. "You don't wanna kill each other," he gritted out, sounding disgusted. "Frankly, I don't got much to live for. So here's the deal: Florence Bluth is going to fix things so that Eva will be let go here, into these tunnels, and when she is, Jiminy Cricket is gonna be here to greet her."

Jim gaped at him.

"Any last words?" Lalah asked Sawyer.

"What will be yours?" Sawyer responded.

They were both pointing their guns at each other. Jim knew who would be able to fire first – Lalah. And then Sawyer would be gone. He was actually trusting Jim to take care of that girl, to help her escape. Why? Sawyer had done the fastest heel face turn he'd ever seen.

Jim suddenly saw a light flicker somewhere behind Lalah, he frowned, and the light was gone.

Lalah turned around, probably having seen that small stream of light too. And before she – or anyone else could react, someone appeared form behind her and hit her hard over the head with a rock, once – twice – until she was unconscious on the ground.

"I've never done that before," the woman breathed, sounding more scared than exhilarated.

"You did just fine, Shaky," Sawyer said, he showed Claret his wounded leg. "Now mind helping a dying man here?"

**. . . . **

Jim could see the people walking out on the street through the big glass wall; his own reflection was in fragments, and he looked down at the empty glass on the small table in front of him.

There were a lot of people in the café; Jim had watched every single one of them, wondering which one had written the letter. If he was supposed to see a sign or something to whom it was. But no one had approached him, so he sat down alone, even though there was a cute frizzy blonde giving him flirty glances in the corner.

"Jim Al?"

The voice shocked him, as he'd been lost in his thoughts, and he almost fell off his chair – turning around so fast. The man that had spoken to him was smiling, but he wasn't the man on the photograph.

"My name is Ethan Rom," the man introduced himself, extending a hand.

And he didn't have the same name either. Jim knew his father's name now. And it meant absolutely nothing.

Jim stared, hesitating before he shook it. "I guess you know who I am." The joke about his own good looks got caught on his tongue; he wasn't able to say anything more, and if he did he would probably throw up or something.

Ethan Rom sat down on one of the high chairs. "Are you okay?" he suddenly asked, all the formalness of his introduction gone.

Jim made a noise. Ethan seemed to have taken that as a comforting yes, and smiled again. The guy had a very creepy smile.

"You do look like your father."

No he didn't. Jim still couldn't say anything.

"I work for Mittelos Bioscience," Ethan told him. "You might have heard of it. We work over in Portland. Your father is very important to us, and when we heard he had a son – a talented son – just like him. We had to come and talk to you."

He said 'we' and there was only him. Jim thought there was a possibility he was mad.

"So…" Jim was glad his voice was steady, and that he had gotten his voice back. He leaned back in his chair as nonchalantly as he could. "You want me to work for you, don't you? After sending me this very creepy stalker letter about my supposed father. And now you're sayin' he doesn't want to see me?" He snorted. "Did I get this right?"

"No, you didn't." Ethan was still acting polite, but Jim could see he was surprised at the way Jim was acting.

"Ah, just a B minus then." Jim sighed dramatically.

"We do want you to work for us," Ethan clarified. "Here…" He handed him a pamphlet. Jim took it up, almost laughing at the sight of the too-green grass and too-big smiles from the people on the cover. "It's great," Ethan continued, sounding like he thought it was hell on earth.

He'd really thrown Ethan off his game here; with the way Ethan was rushing to finish their conversation. "We need biologists. You're one."

"Observant," Jim said. Well, actually, it wasn't. There wasn't a rule on how biologists were supposed to act or look, but nobody without knowing him could ever know it was his profession.

"And your father actually wants to see you very much," Ethan said very quickly. "And he's there, in Portland."

Jim didn't have an answer to that, so he just pretended to read the first page in the pamphlet, but the words were swimming in front of his eyes. "

Here's my number." Ethan put down a card on the table. "Call me if you want to discuss things further."

He left, and Jim dropped the pamphlet, it landed on the floor and he didn't bother to pick it up.

Ethan Rom had just gone outside, the door to the café closing behind him when his phone rang.

"Yes?" he said.

"How much do I get paid?" Jim barked at the other end of the line.

**. . . .**

"Hi, Ben," Flor said when Ben rolled into the room in his wheelchair. She remembered him clearly, all too clearly, and it was with luck she was able to speak at all. She looked down, trying to compose herself for what was coming next. Her mind was racing – she wasn't good at this! She wasn't good at being in control. She needed to stop thinking about Rosalie – blood, tears – and concentrate on Eva. This was all for her.

"Hello, Florence," Ben replied slowly. And Flor, she looked up, but she avoided his gaze. She couldn't look into his eyes, not yet.

"I believe you have something to tell me," Ben continued.

"Yeah." Flor nodded; maybe if she nodded long enough she would stop freaking out. This was the next part. "Do you think I've gained weight?"

The question was so absurd that even Ben looked completely shocked.

"What?" Juliet said at his side.

"It feels like I have gained weight." Flor scratched the back of her neck, and the Others exchanged confused glances.

For took down her hand and started to slowly, almost unnoticeably unbutton her vest. "Oh, right," she said in pretend surprise, "it's just the weight of the explosives I'm wearing."

Immediately all the safety of the weapons were released and pointed at her. Flor made a nervous smile, but there was no question about it.

"Yeah, shoot at the explosives, b-brilliant idea," Flor said, still avoiding to look at Ben's face. She was a walking bomb. "Now, I want to negotiate."

**. . **

"Andy's gone," Kim explained. "She saved me and then she just left. That's worse than sleeping with someone and never calling them back."

"You think she left because of you?" Libby said, sounding too calm as always.

"No, that would be selfish and Andy's not… selfish. I just… I think…" She looked at Libby and shrugged. "Maybe I should have listened to her more."

"When?"

Kim looked down. "She was trying to tell me something before. And I told her I didn't believe her. Even though I knew, even back then, that she was telling me the truth."

"What truth?"

"Guys!" They both looked up and saw Hurley jogging towards them. "Guys! Fox just told me – he said he –"

"Calm down," Libby told him, and Hurley sat down beside her.

"He just took off!" Hurley exclaimed wildly.

"Took off?" Kim stared at him. "Why?"

"I don't know. He said he knew how to get us all rescued, somethin' about you moving out… then he just walked right off into the jungle looking like he was going to die or whatever."

Kim tried to stand up, Libby helped her.

"I need to go after him," Kim said, getting her crutch.

"Go? After him?" Libby was shaking her head. "No, Kimika. You need to stay here. Andrea left me in charge of you –"

"Hey!" Kim held up her other crutch. "I will hit this into your head if you try to stop me, Libby;" she said fiercely, regretting her words but there was no time to say she was sorry. "The – the – the bastard knows how to get us rescued. I'm going."

**. . **

"While this little act is real fun, now that Jimmy-boy is busy trying to save his friends you mind telling me why I shouldn't put a bullet in you too?" Sawyer whispered to Claret, who was taking care of his wound the best she could with the little Sawyer had brought with him in his bag.

Claret looked up at him with her big blue eyes. "I knocked out two people today. I hid and tied one up in a closet. I destroyed monitors and the communication line they have. There's a woman d-dying behind me and I'm not even crying." The last was a lie, tears were running down her face, but it was possible she didn't notice. "I'm doing this, Sawyer. Because I am tired of being used as a puppet. And because I'm tired of trying to s-save Florence Bluth's life."

"Trying to save her…" Sawyer lowered his voice when he saw Jim glance up. "What the hell are you talking about?"

"Their leader…" Claret mumbled. "It's a long story. Now, you need to get out of here. I might be able to help you free Sean, but that's it."

"What? We can't go up there! Flor's wearing explosives and there'll be bloodthirsty guards –"

"No," Claret interrupted him, she wiped some sweat off her upper lip, "there won't be any guards because they are too busy trying to figure out why Flor walked right into their clutches, and to question how and why Locke blew up the submarine. And they won't let Eva go, and Flor w-won't threaten anybody, because in any second now they're gonna bring Sean out to her and threaten her with him. Unless we get to him first."

Sawyer bit his lip when she tied the clothing around his leg.

"So now you better stand up!"

Sawyer groaned loudly as Claret helped him up on his feet. He swore. Claret glanced at Jim.

"What're we gonna do about him?"

"Let him run off." Sawyer sighed. "He just wants to find his princess or somethin'."

Claret nodded. Okay," she said.

"You can't save her, buddy!" Sawyer shouted to Jim who was desperately trying to stop Diane's bleeding. "You ain't no Florence Nightingale. You better run away now, 'cause they're comin'!"

Jim stayed put.

Claret stared at the woman lying there, she gulped, looking away.

Sawyer shrugged. "Let's go then."

**. .**

"Everybody leave." It was the first thing Ben said after Flor had shown them she was a ticking bomb.

"Ben –" Juliet protested.

"Everybody leave now! You will leave the radio here with me, and you will stay in contact."

Everybody turned to Flor.

"You really don't want him dead, do you?" she whispered. She could let them go. They wouldn't let him die. She hoped.

"We can't –"

"Leave!" Ben shouted.

They all looked shocked, like they didn't expect – never had seen – their leader act like that. Like he actually was scared of her, of what she could do.

Juliet left first, and the Others trailed after her, all looking frightened. Somehow, Flor didn't feel any more secure by that.

When the door closed to the room, Ben leaned forward. "What are you doing here?" he spat. "You're not supposed to be here, Florence! I let you go!"

Flor's eyes widened. "You let me go? You were trying to kill me!"

Ben made an annoyed sound. And he looked nothing like the calm composed man that had offered her breakfast by the sea, this was someone completely else. He looked like someone who wasn't in control of their feelings, someone who was frustrated, angry

He looked down like he'd realized it, and after a long deep breath he said, a little calmer, "What do you want?"

"What?"

"What do you want, Florence? You waltz in her, getting yourself caught easily, - on purpose. You show us that yes, you are wearing explosives. So obviously you want something in return for not blowing yourself up. Also, what's strange is that you don't seem to have anything that'll trigger the explosives on you. And I doubt you have anything that'll work. So what do you want, Florence? What is so important to you that you'll die for it?"

"I want…" Flor swallowed. "I want Eva. I want to trade myself for Eva."

"And the explosives?"

"Is in case you don't agree to it," Flor finished in a weak voice.

"Well," Ben leaned back, "what can I say? I didn't know you had the guts to do anything like this. But here's how it is: my people, they won't let Eva go. Never. And they will convince you to remove your explosives by threatening your friends, Brian, Boone, Claire, Sean… And then they will kill you."

Flor bit her lip, concentrating on a spot on the table with her eyes.

"Unless…"

She looked up, and for the first time into Ben's eyes.

"You knock me out, use the explosives to get your way out of here and flee before anyone can do anything to you," he said.

Flor swallowed. "Why did you say you were sorry?"

"What do you mean?"

"When… when I helped you… escape. You said you were sorry. Is it for the same reason you said you let me go? It's strange how everyone under your command wants me dead, but not you."

Ben was silent.

"And no, I won't go. Not without Eva."

"Didn't you just hear what I said?"

"Yes. I did. And we'll just see how it goes, why don't we?"

"This is by far the worst rescue mission I've ever seen in my lifetime," Ben muttered and called in his people again.

**. .**

Diane's pulse stopped.

Jim stood up, blinking hard as he made his way over to Lalah. She was, unlike the other woman, breathing. He searched through her pockets for weapons, for anything useful. And he found more small knives.

Sawyer and Claret had taken all the other weapons. He didn't know their plan. He didn't know how Claret could've been on Sawyer's side all this time, and honestly? He didn't freaking care anymore.

He'd just shot at Lalah, thus ensured his own death certificate. He didn't feel as scared as you would think; perhaps the panic would come later.

He put on the flashlight, and followed Garret's tracks through the tunnels. He'd heard the rumors about what happened at the forbidden area. Living nightmares, but he was already living in one. So, what the hell.

Jim couldn't believe that he had once thought of the island as beautiful.

**. . . .**

His friends were confused, and they had every right to be. Jim just left, disappeared from his life and his girlfriends (Quinn and Carmen, he hoped they wouldn't find out about each other) and he drank the drink Ethan gave him, fell asleep and woke up a long time later in a submarine.

He was confused at first if he was hallucinating or not, but Ethan assured him all was real. (But he muttered that he probably was still a little drugged up.)

And when he stepped out on the brig and saw the island for the first time – it was more amazing that anything that Jim could imagine – he knew it was, and he couldn't believe he was so lucky.

As he and some other recruits, all in a daze – except for Jim who was jumping up and down in excitement – walked down to the land he pointed out everything he saw to Ethan.

Jim might have squeaked when he caught sight of a plant by the dock. "Do you know what that is?" he asked Ethan.

"Probably not," Ethan muttered, glancing at the green leaves which looked like any ordinary leaves ever.

"This place is awesome! I can't wait to start working." Apparently he could wait, as he stopped in his tracks to wink at a young woman walking behind him.

"Who's she?" he asked Ethan, and giggled of all things.

"Felicity Hale. She's the new medical research assistant."

"Awesome!"

He'd calmed down a little when they arrived at the Barracks. Ethan left Jim quickly, saying that someone was coming to help him settle in.

Jim looked around at the palm trees and yellow houses. There was music playing from somewhere.

A very pretty brunette girl walked up to Jim. "Hello," she said, sounding a little nervous, she extended a hand but Jim didn't take it (he was too busy staring at Felicity Hale again.)

"Hello!" the girl repeated again and Jim turned to her. She looked down at her notepad. "I'm your… uh…"

"Future?" Jim helped her out.

"I can't read this," she said, "my mom's – Liz's handwriting is absolutely awful." Jim could relate to that. "My name is Maddy," she continued. "And I am the one assigned to show you around here."

"You talk weird," Jim pointed out.

"Oh… okay."

"So when do I get to see my father?"

"Fa-father?" Maddy blinked. She looked confused for a few seconds before she asked in a serious tone, "Are you still drugged?"

"Yeah!" Jim grinned and nodded his head eagerly. "I mean, no. My father Alpert."

"Richard? He has a son?" She looked stunned.

Jim's smile faltered. "I – I thought I was supposed to see him."

Maddy looked down at her notepad again. "I… I need my da – Garrett, I mean. But… father? Richard?"

**. . . .**

"I was going to check up on Shreyans," Claret told him, hushed but fast as they moved through the tunnel. "He's… he's one of the Others. Kind of new. It was then he told me that you were coming, that Lalah and the others had left to search after you. And it just – it was like the last drop. I didn't even know I had the strength before he was lying there on the floor and all his devices were destroyed. It was almost like I blacked out."

"You should black out more often," Sawyer muttered, looking at everything but her.

"Uh, maybe." Claret looked a little confused. "Then – then I knew that my time with the Others was o-over." She turned her head down. "So I destroyed the monitors. Contacted Ben and told him everything was okay. And I gave Bonnie a key and a note explaining she couldn't trust Boone and had to escape… Brian was looking at me funny, I wonder if he knew…"

"Bonnie? She got captured? Did they hurt her? I swear if they –"

"She's not captured anymore, hopefully. And then I ran because I had to get to you and warn you that they had caught Flor and that you had failed."

"Oh, we haven't failed. You see, she was supposed to get captured." Sawyer smirked, looking quite proud of himself.

"What kind of plan is that?"

"The kind where she threatens to blow their leader to smithereens unless they do what she says."

"It's also the kind where they threaten Sean, and – and Claire and everybody else unless she do what they say! It's a horrible plan!"

"That's just Plan B," Sawyer said.

"Plan B?" Claret squeaked. "What was Plan A?"

"Now it's time for Plan C," Sawyer went on, ignoring her question. "We need to get Colonel Kurtz and Dr. Giggles out of there."

"Who?"

Sawyer sighed, "O'Donnell."

"And?"

"Dr. Giggles."

**. .**

Zidler stayed around long enough to hear Andrea's speech, and then he left. Considering what'd happened the last time he left alone to search after a person Margo needed more than him, it was pretty brave of him.

He avoided the traps, and decided to walk on the beach instead. He hoped it was the path Wendy had chosen – because of what'd happened the last time they both ventured into the jungle.

Really, it was a wonder Zidler even got up in the morning.

He saw a smoke in the distance; happily he picked up his pace. Wendy was closer than he thought.

After a long time wandering around and thinking that maybe the smoke was moving away from him somehow. He saw a figure walking towards him, it was Wendy.

They both slowed down, and Zidler stopped until Wendy was right in front of him. She was looking a bit embarrassed, but also a bit distant. Even though her eyes met his it was like she was seeing something else.

"I'm selfish," Wendy said.

Zidler put his hands into his pockets a little bit awkwardly. "No, Wendy, don't say –"

"But I am." Wendy nodded to herself. "I really am. Everyone here… everyone's learned something from being here, you know? Like, you two. You and Margo. You were pretty much by yourselves in the beginning, waiting to get rescued like the rest of us. But you then started to take a part of things, and you started to care, and you started to accept and you don't complain."

"Actually I do. A lot. In my head."

"And If I'd just stopped to think back then. When you and I were talking. This would've gone a lot faster. But all I could think of was myself."

"What do you mean? Gone faster –"

Wendy looked up. "Us. Getting rescued. I know how to get us rescued." She finally smiled; bright but still a bit sad, like she was feeling ashamed.

She patted him on his shoulder when she walked past him on her way to the camp. Zidler trailed after her, thinking he'd wait for her to explain further so they wouldn't get into another fight. He was happy about his friend being back, but…

Rescued?

She knew how to get them rescued.

**. .**

Ben was right. The first thing the Others did was to threaten Claire, Brian, Boone and Sean.

Flor, despite the sweat running down her back, was feeling like she'd been covered in ice. And it was like she wasn't in control of her body anymore, that the voice saying she didn't care wasn't hers.

Juliet had sent down two Others to get Boone and Brian out of their cell. When they arrived, they saw that Shreyans was gone, the surveillance cameras were out and that the only line between them, Garrett, Lalah, Jim and Diane was gone.

Juliet heard this. Everything was seriously falling apart. They needed Brian and Boone, everything else could be done later.

Flor told them, though it didn't feel like her, that they could do whatever they wanted to them. She didn't care. All she wanted was for them to let Eva go.

The guards saw both Boone and Brian were lying passed out in their cell, and that Bonnie McQueen had disappeared.

But they had their orders.

Then Ben gave her the radio. It was Brian on the other line. And he was begging her to not to it, to give up, that he didn't want to die.

"I'm not going to burn up in front of you, saying sorry," Flor whispered. And it was like she woke up again, she cleared her throat, seeing everything clear again.

Nobody understood what she meant; Flor hoped they wouldn't take the radio away from her. Because she had to make Brian understand.

"_No, you're gonna explode_," Brian said, and Flor's heart sank in her chest. He didn't get it. "_Just like the raft did. And there isn't going to be any diamonds leading your way over the water_."

He did. He did understand. And Flor could've smiled if it weren't for the fact that they were both in such danger.

"_Flor, don't do it_," Brian said. "_Think of the people you are hurting. Think of this as your chance to – to, I don't know, redeem yourself_."

"I am redeeming myself by trying to save Eva."

"_Eva? Rosalie's kid?_"

"Yes. And they are going to let me go. Or else they're all going to die."

"_You know I'm in danger? You know they'll kill me and Boone if you do this?_"

"Yes," Flor said, she blinked hard to stop the tears that almost fell. "And I – I don't… care."

"_Flor!_" Brian shouted desperately. "_You're just confirming everything_ –"

"Goodbye, Brian. You are a sacrifice for the greater good." She slid the radio across the table. "You see now?" she said. "I care about nothing else than her."

"All right." Juliet looked at her. "Then we'll kill Sean, you do care about him, don't you?"

"I don't even know if you have him," Flor said weakly.

Juliet picked up the radio. "Ethan," she said, "bring him in – what? What do you mean you don't –" She glanced at Flor.

Flor smiled faintly. Sean wasn't with them.

"All right, no – just leave it. Get Jack instead."

Now, _that_ she hadn't thought of at all.

**. .**

**Author's Notes: **I've posted an explanation on benry . tumblr . com about why the chapter was posted and then deleted. I'm really sorry about that.This is the finished product,some changes, but not as many as there were supposed to be since it was posted before.

Thanks so much for the response from the last chapter! So, tell me what you think, again. You know I love it when you do!

Namaste.


	50. Bright Hope, Part 2

_A dark unfathom'd tide  
Of interminable pride—  
A mystery, and a dream,  
Should my early life seem;  
I say that dream was fraught  
With a wild, and waking thought  
Of beings that have been,_  
_Which my spirit hath not seen,  
Had I let them pass me by,  
With a dreaming eye!  
Let none of earth inherit  
That vision on my spirit;  
Those thoughts I would control,  
As a spell upon his soul:  
_For that bright hope at last  
_And that light time have past,  
And my worldly rest hath gone  
With a sight as it pass'd on,  
I care not tho' it perish  
With a thought I then did cherish,_

- By Edgar Allan Poe

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 41, Bright Hope Part 2**

**. .**

Normal. Normal_ness_.

How quick can someone with normal_ness_ adapt to these kinds of circumstances?

**. .**

Andrea chose to go with Milou. Frankly, she doubted she would make it back in one piece to the camp if she went with Janna to set up the antennas. Milou, though not very talkative, at least said more things than Janna, and Andrea could see that she tried.

Janna would go deeper into the jungle while Milou and Andrea took their antenna up to higher ground. It reminded Andrea of the time she and Kim journeyed with their radio, trying to contact someone, anywhere. It seemed like such a long time ago. But the instincts – the fear was still there.

"So, it was Penelope Widmore who sent you?" Andrea broke very awkward silence between them as they headed up the mountain, stepping over the bushes growing wildly on the ground.

"I thought I'd made that clear," Milou said without changing her expression one bit.

"Yeah," Andrea panted slightly. Milou looked like she was completely unaffected by having climbed up a mountain-side. "I was just wondering." With a side-glance she continued, "So… have you met her?"

Milou stared at the path in front of her. "No," she replied simply.

Andrea frowned, glancing at the woman again. "She employed you."

Milou broke her gaze, and looked away at the jungle far down below them. "And?"

Andrea huffed, shaking her head. "You really don't like me, do you?" she snapped, irritated from the long journey and from Milou's attitude and the fact that Kim –

"It's just my personality, I have nothing against you." Milou looked down, and under her breath she muttered, "Maybe I do now." Louder she continued, "Why does it bother you so much?"

"What?" Andrea asked.

Milou gave her a short side-glance. "Penelope Widmore."

Andrea didn't answer at first, tentatively she said, "Do you know my full name?"

"Eh…" Milou wetted her lips, looking at Andrea's wrist. "What's the time?"

Andrea looked down at the clock and stopped in her tracks. "Six o'clock… it was six o'clock fifteen minutes ago, too."

"Let me see," Milou walked over to her, and without a warning grabbed her arm hard. Andrea made a frustrated noise and slapped her hand away.

"Ow!" Andrea massaged her arm, even though it hadn't hurt. "You don't trust me?"

"Just. Let. Me. See."

When Andrea didn't do anything to give it to her, Milou glowered at her, and took off the watch from her wrist quickly before Andrea could do anything about it. She childishly skipped a few steps away.

"What the –" Andrea tried to get the watch back, reaching out with her hand but Milou slapped it away just like she had done.

Andrea made almost a growl-like sound and lashed out. She crashed into Milou, almost tackling her to the ground. Milou stumbled back and clawed at her arms to stay up on her feet. She dropped the watch and they both watched, clinging to each other, as it fell over the side of the mountain down to the trees below.

**. .**

Kim wasn't stupid. She knew she wouldn't make it very far. But she had hopes that Fox would hesitate, over think, and would be slow too so maybe – just maybe – she would be able to catch up to him, as he'd run away so fast.

"Fox!" she shouted into the trees.

She had gotten rid of Libby and Hurley, but she was sure they were going to venture into the jungle after her too.

"Fox!" she shouted again, now desperate. She froze, hearing something. It almost sounded like a yelp.

With her crutches she tried to make her way over the terrain. She felt a shot of pain on the side of her stomach, but tried not to think too much about it.

What she saw didn't surprise her so much.

Fox was trapped in a net, the one Margo and Zidler said Fred had gotten trapped in.

Kim sighed, almost smiling to herself. "You didn't answer when I shouted."

"S-smashed… move…" Fox got out. His arm had somehow gotten pressed against his face.

Kim blinked.

"Help…"

"Oh, right." Kim looked around, she let go of one of her crutches, winced at the pain, but didn't care as she looked for a sharp stone or anything on the ground.

"Why… a-after… m-me… m-m-moved… out…"

"Because I want to get rescued," Kim said, finding a gray stone that she doubted would work but she could at least try.

"Wha…"

"You told Hurley –" Kim stood up again, biting her lip as she leaned against the crutch, she waited until the pain was gone , or at least faded away a little, "– that you knew how to get us saved." She walked up to him, trying to somehow cut through the rope holding him up. She looked at him. "So… do you, do you know a way?"

"…Yeah."

Kim sighed, giving up with the rock. She looked around again, biting her lip harder at the pain on her back now. "How?"

It was kind of hard to keep up a conversation, but what else could she do? She hoped Libby and Hurley would come soon.

"L-long s-story."

"Everything is a long story with you," Kim muttered. "I'm going further in, I'll be right back!"

She went further into the jungle again; she could still see Fox, so hopefully she could be able to aid him if a monster attacked him or something. She found a smaller rock with a much sharper edge and returned, halting.

"This will hopefully work," Kim said. After a long time of trying to cut the rope she said, "This can take a while."

**. .**

Sean was resting his head on Claret's lap, mumbling to himself or to someone else – either way he was speaking gibberish. Sawyer was leaning next to the door, trying hard not to show how much he was in pain. Outside their hiding place (it was a small storage of sorts, Claret had glanced in the boxes and seen papers and papers and papers with names she didn't know and didn't want to know about) they could hear Ethan walking back and forth. Claret had a pile of boxes at her side, and she was terrified she would accidentally knock them over as she stroked Sean's hair.

"Sean is this way." Claret had said after they'd got out of the tunnels, looking like she wanted to take Sawyer's hand then, but she hadn't. There was too much lying between them. The way she'd interrogated him before, trying to act cold. She could tell him later that she hadn't meant it. But she knew he wouldn't believe her.

Sawyer had showed her a different exit, and to her surprise – it had led directly to the corridors in which Sean was hidden, Sven, and other things and people she didn't like to think about.

She had seen Ethan; he was guarding the corridors underground. His face was in half and horribly scarred. She'd heard it was Owen who did it.

Her back had hit the wall with a thud, as she'd desperately had tried to calm herself down. She couldn't think too much of what could go wrong because then she couldn't do this.

Ethan had heard the sound, but he'd gone the wrong way. And suddenly the door to Sean's room had been unguarded. When Sawyer had seen the state Sean was in – Claret didn't want to think about the way his eyes had gone dark. She also didn't want to think about whether Sean would ever recover or not.

So now they were trying to hold their breaths hiding there in the room, Claret praying that Sean would stop mumble, and hoping that nobody would hear.

"I don't have him. I can't bring him in. Sean's gone!" they heard Ethan shout into his radio. "Maybe three minutes ago – Juliet! Shouldn't we search for him?" Silence. "All right, I'll get Shephard. You better send some people down here…" They heard him grumble to himself, steps fading away.

"Feels like everything is just going according to plan," Sawyer muttered, standing up.

"So this is Plan B?" Claret asked. "We have Sean…"

Sean mumbled something about airplanes.

"…But now they're going to get Jack," she finished.

"Then we'll just have to get him before they do. And this is Plan C, remember?" Sawyer said, opening the door just an inch to check if it was clear. "We better get goin' –"

"Sawyer," Claret interrupted him. "There's no getting Jack."

"What the hell are you talkin' about?" Sawyer turned to look at her. "I know it won't."

"Jack… Jack's changed."She didn't mention that what Sawyer just said was the understatement of the century. Claret looked down at Sean, and raised his head so she could help him up. He was heavy, but she couldn't ask Sawyer to help her, not just yet. "And… and we shouldn't… and we can't…"

"You're rambling, Stacy. Let's go now before anybody gets down here." He walked over to her, taking some of Sean's weight off her shoulder as he took one of his arms around his own.

"No," Claret protested. "I mean, yes. We should leave." They dragged Sean out back to the corridor. "Away, back to the tunnels – and away from here. We can't take Jack with us. W-we can't."

"You got thirty seconds to give me a good reason."

"Well – he, uh…" Claret stuttered something incoherent. "He… you don't even like him! Sawyer, let's just go!" Her voice was high-pitched, and he turned to look at her hysterical face.

"You leave," he said to her. "You get the hell out of here. Follow the blood from the guy Jim's trail; try your best not to die. And don't switch sides again."

Sawyer went the way Ethan had gone, much slower, halting on his leg. It was still bleeding.

Claret now supported the weight of Sean on her own, and they both, just as slow, went to take the road back to the dark tunnels.

**. .**

Owen watched Vincent walk away from her house. She nodded at the guard standing on her porch before closing the door behind her. In her hand she held a not she was supposed to be memorizing. Owen dropped it in the hall (it landed on the floor behind her) walking towards her bedroom.

There were still shards of broken glass all over the floor. But the lamp had been removed. Carefully she walked over to the open window and closed the drapes as best she could.

"Lousy security," she heard a voice say behind her.

"Stop being so smug, a teenage girl broke into my house before you." Owen turned around, a piece of glass in her hand as a weapon. "She didn't last very long."

Bonnie looked like she was suppressing a laugh, she was leaning against the wall, the same wall Owen had been backing into when Eva had broken in. "A piece of glass," Bonnie raised her eyebrows, "really, Owen?"

"I can scream very loud too," Owen informed her.

"Bet you can." Bonnie took a step forward. "Bet that guard outside isn't here just for your protection. Bet they're watching us right now too."

"Then you just lost that bet," Owen said with a smile, "there's no one watching us at all right now. The cameras are fake. And we got all the time in the world. Now, do you want to know where Eva is or not?"

**. .**

Jim had a difficult time to find his way out of the tunnels. He was usually described by people as a very care-free person, and not in the complimentary way. But now he was counting up all his problems. He could barely see in the darkness, less follow the little trail Garrett had left behind (he'd lived for a long, long time, Jim knew that, so he also knew that there was a possibility Maddy's dad was a ninja, which explained _everything_.)

He was bleeding from a wound on his head, and by the way he felt dizzy he'd lost a lot of blood. Or he was dizzy because he'd just watched a woman bleed to death under his hands. It explained the tears rolling down his face. He wasn't sweating, but he refused to believe he was crying. He wasn't sad.

He'd fired a bullet at Lalah, at _Lalah._ He liked her. She was awesome in her own way. She was one of the few women in the world who wouldn't even flirt with him some way.

Jim was panting, and he stopped to fall down on his knees, breathing in fast, almost hyperventilating. He knew the feeling, and he swallowed hard. He heard the same usual music in his ears; he didn't even bother to try to think of anything else.

Jim was so screwed.

Not in the good way, but in the very bad way. The path to hell was supposed to be fun, not utterly devastating. Maybe he needed to re-calculate some things in his life.

Jim dragged himself up on his feet again. He had things to look forward to.

Like the forbidden area.

**. . . . **

Jim scratched the back of his neck, trying to not look as awkward as he felt. On his side Madeline – Maddy – was standing while he himself was sitting. It felt like she was his babysitter or something. At least she looked as lost as he felt.

He was sitting in front of their leader for asking about his father. He wondered where Ethan had run off to, the liar.

"Could you leave the room?" Benjamin Linus, who was the leader, _the man in charge_, the boss, said.

Jim began to stand up.

"Not you! Maddy."

Jim looked to see Maddy's expression, and was surprised when he saw that she was looking at him. "I'll stay, I'm his…" She looked down at the notepad again, furrowing her brow as she tried to read. She sighed, and Jim knew she couldn't. She nodded to herself, making a decision as she turned to their leader. "I won't leave him alone with you."

Jim grinned. "She won't leave me alone," he whispered to Ben.

Maddy immediately looked like she regretted her decision.

"All right." Benjamin – Ben, everybody had nicknames (he really hoped no one would call him Jimmy), leaned back in his chair, and then told him the whole story.

Afterwards Jim stumbled down Benjamin's stairs down his porch. He would've fallen if it weren't for Maddy catching him in the last second. She helped him sit down on the last step.

Jim was trying to convince himself that the real reason he'd come to the island was to work, and that his father was just a bonus. But work didn't feel as exciting anymore as Ben had told him that they didn't really need biologists, and that he was supposed to be working in security, leading field missions or whatever. Jim hadn't listed too much after the whole: "Your father doesn't want to see you" speech.

"I know your father," Maddy said, breaking through the wall of depressing thoughts. "Richard Alpert. He's a very good friend of my parent… uh. I never knew he had a son."

"Okay."

"Maybe… maybe he's… worried to meet you."

Jim doubted that. He stared at a pair of trees by the opposite house, across the green grass. And saw a figure there. He blinked. And the person was gone.

It'd almost looked like his father.

"Will you stand up and go with me?" Maddy asked him, regaining his attention back to her. "We missed the tour, but I can show you now, if you would like."

If his father needed some time before seeing him, then fine. Jim could wait.

He nodded, standing up, but not before taking Maddy's hand and making her swirl with a big smile on his face.

She looked a bit stunned.

"I just re-winded," he told her. "Hello, my name's Jim Tyberu Al. I'm very pleased to meet you. You have gorgeous eyes."

Maddy smiled.

**. . . .**

Eva wasn't locked up inside a tower.

Bonnie wasn't hiding inside of the forest, considering what'd happened the last time. No, Bonnie wasn't hiding at all, or well, more in plain sight than anything else.

She pushed her hair out of her face again, feeling a cold chill run through her body as she turned around, it was the fear – her palms were sweaty, it was almost like she was nervous. But Bonnie had trained for hours, days, week, for that feeling to go away when she was in front of the cameras.

Because Eva was very close, too close, if Bonnie took eight steps – reached out her arm, she would be able to touch her. But she didn't. And she actually couldn't, because there was a wall and a window between them still and the people inside, the guards, had probably seen her face and knew who she was and it wouldn't be like it was now: people simply glancing without taking care.

All they saw was one of them, perhaps some of them were slowing down – she was wearing a jumpsuit, not all of them were. But it wasn't too unusual. They couldn't know that there was a young guard who was supposed to be watching the back of the house, lying hidden behind branches by the edge of just the forest she didn't dare to go into, that Bonnie had stolen her outfit from.

Eva wasn't locked up inside a tower. She was surrounded by people (guards, armed guards) in a circle, and she was remarkable – high posture, defiant stare, and a stubborn almost-frown on her face that looked so much like Rosalie's it made Bonnie almost want to cry her name out just in case.

Why didn't they hide her better than keeping her inside a house? Bonnie wondered, maybe they were afraid, afraid of them. The way everyone was running like they'd all lost their heads – yeah, the Others were scared. They'd scared them. Just a few people, barely any weapons, they had been just an inconvenience in the beginning, like a nasty insect that just annoyed you and didn't do any harm. But now they were much more.

Bonnie was a standing target, but nobody noticed, because to some of them she was still that annoying insect. And they couldn't believe she would just be strutting around in their community without as much as a care.

But Bonnie wasn't that stupid, she had a weapon of her own. A weapon in the form of the woman being escorted over the grass by two men, a woman with one green eye and one blue.

Owen Chauncey didn't even look her way. But Owen knew Bonnie was there, that Bonnie was ready. And as Owen stepped inside the house on her way to Eva, she also knew that she could tell Vincent and the other guard that Bonnie was there and she would be shot on the spot – quickly. Bonnie was unimportant. She wasn't a priority, not like Eva. Owen had had her suspicions, but when she saw the girl there, looking at her without any fear when she stepped inside the room, she knew something else too. Eva was perhaps the most important thing they had, more important than Owen herself – in their eyes, of course.

"What's she gonna do, run?" Owen said, pretending to be clueless as to the reason why Eva was set under guard. It wasn't of fear she was going to escape.

"Try to talk to her, explain it all," Vincent reminded her.

"Dude, she's right there," Owen nodded at the girl but still walked over to her. Eva was standing up even though there was a chair; Owen sat down on it, looking up at her.

"I'm supposed to have a deep talk with you now," she told Eva, "even though you broke into my house and I have to admit, you were almost threatening back then. You see, Eva. There are some people here, who like you, have broken into this little nice place. And they want to take you away. And they – they…" She glanced Vincent's way, his usually warm eyes looked cold, and his lips were pressed together in a thin line. She continued, "they're bad people. They're kind of like me, a lot like me, they only care 'bout themselves. And they've killed, shot, raised a little more hell than there already is here. And now they're coming after you. You get that? These people are coming after you. And they're going to hurt you. And all… and all…" She swallowed. "All we want is to protect you."

Eva met Owen's gaze. "And who knows?" Owen whispered. "Perhaps they are watching us… right now… waiting for a chance to do _something_."

She tore her gaze from Eva, and looked at Vincent, who was glowering with anger at her last words. Owen wasn't the one for rehearsed speeches, she liked originality. She turned back to Eva. "So, girl of importance," she said, taking her hand, Eva tried to wriggle out of her grip, "you better stay put and be a good little soldier or the bad people are gonna take you or the bad people here are going to hurt you." Owen barely had time to smile before she was snatched up from her seat, and dragged out of the room fast. The door slammed closed. And Eva was still standing; now holding a note in her hand Owen has slipped her that she didn't dare to look at just yet.

**. .**

"We should put it on," Andrea said, nodding at the antenna. They were both too exhausted to fight more. They hadn't settled whose fault it was, and it would do no good. They'd reminded each other that they had a common goal.

"No," Milou replied. "Not yet."

But the current peace could be easily broken. "We have to put it on," Andrea spat, "we don't know the time. We have to chance."

"I know the time by looking at the sun," Milou informed her.

Andrea looked up at the sky, it was darkening, and there were clouds. "No, you don't. Milou, just have a little faith." She reached for the antenna.

"Having faith does you no good," Milou told her sharply, grabbing her hand, she let go immediately though, not wanting to cause another fight that ended with them screwing all the important things up.

"Maybe you need a change of perspective," Andrea told her and turned it on. She hoped it was going better at the beach and in the jungle.

**. .**

"I – I will kill that dog!"

Margo gasped, looking horrified.

"No, no, I was just – angry," Fred told her quickly, worried that she was going to go hormonal on him. "I don't kill animals. It just…" He looked down at the antenna, sighing at the sight of it.

The Labrador Vincent had come running at them. Fred had taken cover in fear of the dog, and Vincent had crashed into the equipment. The transceiver was working though, as best as it could. But Janna and Milou hadn't turned theirs on at time, and now it looked like he wouldn't be able to turn it on again either.

"It's not that bad," Margo took up a piece of wire, holding it up in front of his eyes to show it.

It broke in the middle.

"Oh."

Fred considered pulling out his own hair; it would give him a maniac evil nemesis doctor kind of look, and would perhaps make him feel better.

**. .**

Janna abandoned the antenna that she was just about to switch on, to bring out her gun shooting at the boar charging towards her. It hit, but it didn't stop running for that.

"Hell," she said. And to hell it would go. She climbed up the nearest tree, and saw the boar clamp all over the antenna, she heard it break.

She pointed her gun down again, her other hand curled around a branch. And she put a bullet in its snout.

**. .**

"That went well," Brian said after Flor hung up on him.

Shreyans, an irritated Other who had just spent a long time locked up in a closet (by Claret nonetheless) – Boone had actually laughed at that – had gotten patched up as best he could by a woman called Felicity Hale. And he had spent most of his time glaring at Brian, but now he was looking almost _giddy._

Apparently, it was because he was finally in charge.

The first thing Shreyans did after being put in charge of the two of them, was to tell Felicity to get them to Shephard, while he himself would be trying to salvage what Claret (this made Brian flinch) destroyed.

Felicity immediately retorted, "I'm not a guard, Shreyans."

"Boone, go help Ethan with Shephard," Shreyans said with a sigh, he looked up, saw the suspicious look on Boone's face, and waved him over to his side. They both leaned in to whisper whatever they had to say to each other.

Brian didn't feel left out at all.

When they both left out to the open air, Brian could barely speak, being so overwhelmed. He was without chains. He wasn't free – but it was close, closer than ever before. But the air was wrong, too full of tension, the edgy looks the people were giving them, they were all in trouble and Brian knew the Others weren't used to be on the receiving line of attacks.

"What were you talking about? And with Shephard, did he mean Jack?" Brian tried to hold his voice steady, trying to ignore everything around them. The Others trusted Boone so well that they would let the two wander off on their own.

Just when he'd thought that, he saw that a guard, a man – Colby, he thought his name was, was stalking them. So they didn't trust them at all. That made more sense.

"Yeah, he meant the great leader Jack," Boone muttered. "And he was telling me to tell you that we have to help Ethan." He gave Boone a moment to process it, Ethan, the man who took Claire and Owen. "So, being an Other," Boone went on, "seems exciting, doesn't it? Thrilling. You'll _live_."

There was something very poisonous in the way Boone said the last word.

"What do you mean?" Brian asked, not entirely sure he wanted to know the answer. The guard Colby was still following them. Did Jack have his own house?

"You try very hard to keep yourself alive, is all I'm saying. Selling out your friends, just _joining_ in on a hunch. What if I hadn't… you know, been with them."

"But you are one of them," Brian said.

"No, Brian." Boone sighed, and his face looked grim in a way that Brian only had seen glimpses of in their time of captive together. "I'm _with_ them. Not one of them. It's wide ravine between those two."

Brian thought of what to say to that, when Boone went on speaking, clearly having a lot on his chest to get out. Now what Brian knew the truth.

"And you're not with them or one of them either," Boone said, making Brian look away, "they're just using you now to get what they want. They don't care at all about us. They just have us around because they can't let us go. Either you can fight or try to find some other way… I tried the other way. It's good, it's working. It's not for you." His tone then got lighter. "But I must applaud you on your conversation with Florence, good acting."

Brian didn't know what to do, so he shrugged and tried to accept the fact that Boone was not the same person anymore. He knew that. Brian wasn't as stupid as some would think. Saving Boone's life had come with a price. It was just that Boone had at least tried to keep up an act in front of him, in the cell, tried to pretend he was the same person as before, maybe a little more beaten up. He wasn't pretending now.

The door to what Brian assumed was Jack Shephard's house was wide open. Boone and Brian glanced at each other when they heard someone yelling really loud, followed by an angry answer.

They were shouting so much, that even when they were in the hallway (Colby stayed outside) they couldn't make out the words.

Brian tried to hold in his shock when he saw Ethan's face, taking a step closer to Boone immediately, to be on the safe side, but Boone, he took a step forward to scream, "What the hell's going on here?"

Brian turned to Jack who inhaled very loudly at Boone's words. It was strange seeing him. Brian knew he had been there, with the Others. He just didn't – it'd been a long time. And now Brian was standing next to Boone, who was next to Ethan, they were a united front against Jack Shephard and everything he stood for.

"You fighting? Don't you have anything better to do?" Boone looked at Ethan; Brian stared when Ethan (face split, looking like something out of a horror movie, which just made him more intimidating than before) _shrunk_, like he was ashamed.

Was Boone in authority? But that Other guard Colby had followed them – maybe it wasn't for Boone, maybe it was for him. He felt sick.

"Jack," Boone said, addressing the man on the other side of the room. "Did Ethan explain everything to you?"

"I –" Ethan began., before Boone interrupted him.

"I was talking to Jack."

Jack huffed, shaking his head at the whole thing. He had glanced at Brian when they entered the room, but he hadn't looked at him once more. Now, he was staring at Ethan as he said, "He did. And I was explaining to Ethan why –"

"Honestly, I don't care," Boone said tiredly. "Just come with us."

Jack made no move; he crossed his arms, clearly not wanting to go anywhere.

"Grab him," Boone said without looking at any one of them. Ethan looked confused.

Boone arched an eyebrow. "Oh, so you now have a problem with violence?"

Ethan went over to Jack and grabbed his arm, Jack fought against, it would soon turn into a fight and Brian was watching with rising horror.

Then he noticed Boone was trying to tell him something, nodding his head at them, sighing, rolling his eyes. Did he – he wanted –

Jack was looking at a lamp in the corner, like he was going to throw it at Ethan. But he didn't have the chance because Brian pushed him, making him lose his balance as Ethan drew out a knife, he didn't stab Jack with it, just held it there for him to know he was armed. Ethan grabbed one of his arms in a hard grip, and Brian took the other one.

When they led him down the hallway, Jack shrugged off Brian's weak grip, and glowered at him, Brian couldn't look away. He knew the look of betrayal and disappointment all too well.

In the house Boone, Brian, Ethan and Jack had left, a man stepped out from one of the bedrooms, holding a rifle in his hands.

Sawyer looked at the closed door they'd just left through. Claret had been right. Jack didn't want to come back with him. He was different now.

But according to the screaming match he and Ethan had had, he didn't want to be an Other either.

At least he'd told Sawyer that Bonnie had escaped.

**. . **

The net and Fox crashed into the ground. He was tangled up in it, and it took a few minutes to get him loose. When he did they were both breathless, Kim almost lying down on the ground.

"Are you all right?" they both asked each other at the same time.

"No," they both replied immediately after.

They stared at each other, and then Fox helped Kim to sit up, noticing the wince of pain she tried to suppress, giving her back her crutch.

Kim didn't take it, they were both sitting there close to each other on the ground in a net, and standing up would be much less awkward, but she still didn't take it.

"Why did you leave?" asked Kim.

"W-why did you?" asked Fox.

"I will answer your question if you will answer mine." Kim nodded to emphasize it, once again ignoring the pain in her stomach and backside.

"I – I had to," Fox said after a moment, rubbing the back of his neck, looking down. "I h-had to do things right, for once. Stop being a coward. Be braver."

"You're not a coward," Kim told him.

"N-no, I am."

"Just because you don't tell people the truth, doesn't mean you're a coward," Kim said lightly, looking away. "It means you're a liar. There's a difference."

Fox touched her face so she would turn to look at him, as he said, "You don't tell the t-truth, because you're scared of it, i-it's the same thing, Kim."

She looked at him with wonder and confusion. "Then what were you going to do?"

"I – I'm going after them," he said, "A-andrea, Milou, them. I – I need to tell them something."

"How to get us all rescued?" Kim asked softly, even though it wasn't truly a question at all.

"H-how did you –?"

"I know, Fox. I know why you know." Kim looked down sadly. "I'm a liar too. I've lied _for_ you. But now… you must tell me how we can get rescued, and then you have to – to leave."

Fox knew it had to be that way, but it surprised him that it was Kim who said it. "W-why?"

"They'll hurt you if you tell the truth to them – they'll – if you tell me, and if you aren't here when you do then… then you won't be hurt."

"I – I need to tell everyone myself. I must."

Kim shook her head. "No. No you don't. Don't."

Fox smiled. He leaned forward, as if to kiss her, but Kim pulled back. She took his hand though. She had problem focusing, and she held onto him tight. His face was getting blurry, she blinked several times before continuing, "How can we get rescued, Fox? Tell me."

"I – I have to find A-andrea and tell her and –"

"You'll get lost," said Kim. "You won't find them. Tell me." A tear rolled down her face. Fox opened his mouth to speak. It was then Libby and Hurley found them.

**. .**

Above the toilet there was a very small window. It was too small for anyone to crawl through, and it was also locked. Still, Eva, knowing Vincent was standing on the other side of the door, tried to open it as silently as she could.

In the room she would be returned to stood three guards, not including Vincent and the ones outside, if she even could manage to squeeze through that little place, which she couldn't, she wouldn't get far.

But still Eva tried to pick the lock on the window the best she could, but the latch was down on the outside and the only tools she had were her fingers, teeth and nails.

She almost fell down from the toilet, holding the scream in her throat, when she saw someone outside the window. Dressed in the Others' uniform, now, now they were going to get her.

But the person outside took away the latch, and opened the very small window, were barely her hand could get through. Eva saw blue eyes, blonde hair.

"Got the note?"

Eva just stared.

She spoke quickly, knowing they could – and would – be interrupted any second. "When you see me, come with me. I know I look like one of them but I ain't even close. My name is Bonnie. I'm a friend of your mothers. Lalah asked for your blessing before asking Rosalie to marry her. Mama bear. You can trust me. Did the note Owen gave you tell you what to do? Just blink."

Eva blinked.

The woman outside grinned. "Showtime."

"EVA!" Vincent shouted from the other side of the door. The woman disappeared. Eva jumped down from the toilet, opening the door. Vincent looked relieved at the sight of her all in one piece.

He looked up above her head, wrinkling his forehead. Eva swirled around – the window was still open a notch. He dragged her out into the hallway and back to the room again, throwing her forward, she stumbled on her feet to stand up.

"Watch her!" he barked at the guards. "You two go, we have an impostor somewhere outside." Two of the guards left. There were now two left. "She ain't gonna leave this room for any –"

"Vincent!"

Eva looked up, so did Vincent. The guards closed around her and she couldn't see who had come into the room.

"It's Owen…" She saw Vincent leave with someone and the door closed, but she could hear him scream 'What?'

The door opened again, Vincent looked in, looking sheepish. He walked over to Eva; the guards moved away and put his hands on her shoulders, holding a handkerchief in one, looking into her eyes. "Eva," he said quietly. "I'm so sorry about my outburst before. And I'm very sorry for what I am about to do now."

He looked down at the handkerchief; Eva tried to get out of his grip, he looked sad, hesitated –

The door flew open. "Vincent!" the person yelled who Eva couldn't see. "We need to leave now!"

Eva took the distraction to try to run away from Vincent, a guard grabbed her, and she couldn't escape. But Vincent resigned. "Let's take her outta here. If someone tries anything…" he gave the guards a grim look, "…you all know what to do."

They took her out of the room. Vincent kept close to her. "Eva, if this is the time for you to start talking…"

Eva said nothing, Vincent hadn't expected her to.

"Is this safe?" asked a guard behind them. "We aren't supposed to be moving her –"

"'Course not," Vincent replied. "There is a bomb ticking down outside and we need to get the hell outta here _now._"

**. .**

Flor wondered how many people knew what was happening in the house she was currently in. Was anyone allowed to stay close? Were they running around warning everybody? Or maybe it was kept a secret so panic wouldn't break out.

She hadn't been able to negotiate for them to release Eva at all. She didn't know how many were ready to die for her, but many had seemed ready to kill Flor for Rosalie – and this was her daughter.

First they were going to try to threaten everyone she knew. Sean was gone – it had to be Sawyer or Bonnie's work. This meant that Plan A and Plan B were completely over. So it was time for a different plan, a different approach.

"I want you all to leave."

She didn't have to look at the Others' faces to know they were shocked; she kept her gaze on the table, on a darker spot in the brown. Breathed out and in, "I want you all to leave, and to not come in, not to stay close to this house unless you want to be blown up. But Ben has to stay. You can keep in contact through your radio."

She dared to look up, and saw that everyone was looking at Ben for his reaction.

Ben looked at Juliet. "Well, shouldn't we grant her offer?"

"Ben –" Juliet protested, but it appeared his word was law. One after one they left, guns lowered. She knew they were going to surround the place, but not too closely.

Juliet gave her one last look before she left, it was different, not cold or indifferent but she was looking at her with desperation. The desperation she had when she wanted to save Flor's life. She passed by Flor's chair, and Flor was still as a statue.

When they were all gone, Flor turned to Ben.

Ben spoke before she did. "They are still bringing Jack here, and they will kill him if I tell them to. And if they don't hear an answer from me – they're going to kill him anyway. Do you want to have his death on your conscious?"

"It won't come to that," Flor said.

"Why?"

"Because now you are going to tell them to not lay a finger on Jack, Claire, or anybody else you might have here."

"Why would I do that?"

"Because," Flor said, smiling because she was nervous not because she was happy, "under this table I'm having a gun pointed directly at you. A gun Juliet just gave me."

**. .**

"We should head back," Andrea said to Milou, they'd been sitting next to each other, watching the island before them for a long time without a word spoken between them.

Lori was going to be mad.

Andrea stood up, brushing dirt off her pants, picking up the antenna and her bag.

"So you can search some more?" muttered Milou when she stood up.

Andrea turned around to look at her. "Excuse me?"

"Who are you looking for?" Milou started to walk and Andrea followed her down the hill.

She decided she could tell the truth. "This little girl, called Ellie, she is gone. And I'm hoping, that maybe, she just took a walk and when I walk around that tree I will see her."

They continued to walk on in silence. Andrea glanced at Milou, "I just told you something that was kind of personal."

"I know," Milou replied, after a moment she gave Andrea a smile, as if to suddenly seem nicer.

"You aren't going to tell me something personal of your own? Come on." Andrea smiled back, two could play this game. "Or not, " she said at the look on Milou's face. "So, what is your position at this rescue mission?"

"The protector," Milou said. "I was in charge to protect the science team… then some things happened."

"The science team? Miles, Fred –"

"What Miles does is not science in any sense of the word. There are more to the team, but unfortunately they weren't able to come here, or maybe it was fortunate."

"Who are they?"

"A woman named Lewis, a scientist called Faraday…" She frowned when she saw the thoughtful look on Andrea's face. "What does it matter to you?"

"Faraday… nothing, it means nothing. I was just wondering." Andrea was lying, the name felt familiar, but she couldn't place it right now. "So, Penelope Widmore, is she on the freighter?"

"I've told you: no."

"Right."

**. .**

They didn't leave the house immediately; they got stuck in the living room, as Vincent angrily argued with Shreyans over his walkie-talkie. "_Listen,_" he spat, "I'm not takin' any risks. If it turns out to be a real countdown – I don't care if it's a bluff – her life is more important – no reinforcements available? – No matter. We're leaving."

Vincent ignored Shreyans whole technical babble and "I'll be right there", and made a signal for a guard to walk before him, him and Eva in the middle.

"Sir," the young new recruit Sarah said, "is there –"

"No talking," Vincent cut her off, beginning to walk. Eva stayed put, refusing to move. Still, she made little resistance when Vincent took her arm, not hard, but enough to make her keep a pace up with him.

The door flew open. They stopped abruptly in their tracks. In stumbled a woman who looked like she was going to collapse. Vincent ran forward in just the last second and caught her in her arms. Eva stared at the dried blood on her face, looking like she had been crying red from her almond-shaped eyes.

"Mary Jane…" Vincent said, seeing it was her. A guard helped him make her stand up. Mary Jane was mumbling. Vincent could barely hear what she was saying.

"What happened?" Vincent asked the young woman, holding her face in his hands so she would look at him.

"The survivors," she finally spat out, taking short hoarse breaths, sounding like she had very hard to form words. "T-they're coming."

"They're already here…" Vincent said and Mary Jane closed her eyes, leaning into him, but continued to speak.

"They k-killed me… the fence… they left me… Vince." She opened her eyes again, and even Vincent was stunned by the fire in her eyes. "They know about… about the tunnels. They have C-4."

Vincent swallowed. He turned around. "We need to leave. Now!" He ignored the attempts to contact him through his walkie-talkie. One guard picked Mary Jane up who looked like she was about to faint, and Vincent once again dragged Eva with him.

They all stumbled out of the house in a mess. The guards were disordered, not knowing whether to stay and keep guard, look for the bomb or protect Vincent and Eva. Vincent didn't stay to make sure they knew what they had to do. He walked in the quickest pace he could without actually running away from the house.

"Ya see now?" he said to Eva, through all of the noise from the community. People were running around, shouting orders, closing and locking doors. "Ya see now how dangerous they all are?" He saw Eva's frightened face. "We confiscated that woman's' explosives, there's no way she could get 'em back –"

Vincent cried out and his grip around Eva loosened. From the jungle smoke and fire flared up. He stared at where the explosives had gone off – not at the house, but far away from it. He couldn't believe it. He stood there in shock.

"We need to put the fire out before it spreads!" someone screamed and he came back to life. He whirled around, and saw Eva running back to the house that everyone had evacuated from to a safe distance. There was no one around to catch her.

People were screaming, running, blocking his path as Vincent desperately tried to catch up to the girl. He saw another figure at the edge of the forest – Bonnie – and they disappeared into the jungle together..

**. .**

Juliet saw the smoke in the air, knowing what had happened. She looked at Jack, who was straining against the guards who kept him in place. Their eyes met.

Eva had escaped

**. .**

He saw light at the end of the tunnel, and it wasn't hell fire.

Jim stepped out on a beautiful sanctuary, because that was all it was. There was a small stream, green leaves and a huge tree by the waterfall. There were red and pink Anthuriums decorating the ground, although it grew wildly. You could still see spots of the dark earth, but it just made everything more beautiful in contrast.

He then noticed that the whole place was located in a steep ravine, which he was in the bottom of, tall walls surrounding the sanctuary in a circle. He looked at the tunnel he'd just come out of, there were many more of it, similar, all around. It was a safe place inside a maze.

There would be hard to find the one Garrett had continued on in, and to find a tunnel that led out to the open. He doubted even Garrett knew all the places in this –

The forbidden area.

Jim braced himself for something, anything to happen, whether it be flesh eating monsters or a replay of when Elizabeth Grace Chetwood kicked him on his chin with her foot.

But there was nothing, jus the tinkling from the water, the sound of a breeze through the leaves, there were no nightmares. It was really a sanctuary, an escape from it all. Or maybe – the forbidden are wasn't supposed to be forbidden, maybe Garrett had lied. But it was probably nothing like that.

He looked down at his bloody hands, and went quickly over to the stream to wash it off. The blood was in his arms, and his face, everywhere, and soon he was dripping from the water. He still smelled like blood, but he was cleaner.

He looked up at the gray sky, his mother would have told him to pray now. Jim wasn't a believer.

Sometimes he wished he was.

He searched the entrance of every cave, very carefully, to see any signs of which one Garrett had gone in through. Garrett was a tracker – the best there was, so of course he also knew how to cover up his own tracks. But Garrett also had a daughter that also happened to be Jim's best friend, so when Jim saw the too-smooth ground he chose that cave, hoping that Garrett was there, (while knowing deep down that he wasn't, sad bitter truth) he went into that one.

**. . . . **

Jim had been on a weeklong expedition to the other side of the island. It was painful to watch Botanists examine the plants and wildlife on the island, while he himself had to 'keep watch' which meant babysit.

But it meant getting a few days off to be lazy. It wasn't what Ben had said or anybody else, but it was what he did.

He was lying on Maddy's bed. Maddy herself was standing in front of her bookcase, biting her lip, trying to figure out which book she should read and which book she should pretend to hate to make her parents angry. It was all a very weird and tiring process.

"Who is this leader they speak of?" Jim asked her.

"I do not understand," Maddy said, picking out a book. "We have one leader."

"Yeah, I know. But this one everybody talks about like they're the second coming."

"We are not supposed to talk about it."

"Yet everybody does! And I just nod along, 'cause I'm polite. But do you really want to keep me in the dark. What if I drown or get shot without ever knowing the entire story. _Pleeaase_."

"Fine." She went over to him. "Step away from my bed."

Jim sat up, Maddy seemed to think that was enough. "There have been rumors."

"Garrett and Liz don't believe in rumors," Jim cut in, because he was Jim, and he always had a comment.

"Yes." Maddy looked a bit upset, so Jim decided to make his puppy-eyes look in case she decided to stop telling him the story and go and tell her mother that Jim was in her room. They were both adults, and it would seem weird for anyone else, and it was weird, but it was just how things were.

Maddy sighed and continued, "They are not actually rumors, and I know this. But not many do. There is someone coming to this island, and this person is very important to people like Ben, and my parents." She didn't notice that she called them her parents, and Jim didn't point it out to her. Because that was the worst story ever, it was everything he'd already heard before.

"Do you think she'll be hot?" he asked her.

"How can you be certain it is a she?" said Maddy.

"So, is he hot?" Jim asked.

**. . . . **

When they returned to the camp, Margo was crying, Zidler knew it was probably more from hormones than from missing he and Wendy. But he hugged her and wiped the tears away. He had a grin on his face though, and of course Margo then wanted to know how he dared to look so pleased when she was in such misery.

"Wendy's gonna make an announcement!" He took her hand and led her over to the small group that had assembled around Wendy.

Wendy kept tucking back her hair behind her ears, nervously fingering on the little curls. She met Zidler's eyes, and he nodded, to say he was there and had her back. She seemed to become a little calmer at that, and cleared her throat loudly.

Not many had realized she'd gone, so Wendy skipped that whole part, getting right into telling them about when she escaped from the Others.

Many were surprised – the fact that she talked about it at all, the fact that she even _talked_ – it was shocking. And now she had something important to say.

"We came out to this valley, of sorts, and it was dark but I could see this tall tower. It was a radio tower, and we passed it closely, and I could hear a transmission – the French transmission. He told me to leave it be. And we did, because we had to get back and then…" Wendy stopped herself, and swallowed.

"Wait…" Hurley frowned. "The kind of radio tower thingy Andrea and the rest went to put up all those weird antennas for? That kind?"

Wendy nodded.

"A radio tower? Here, on the island?" Sun said, looking at her husband on her side.

"Are… you… sure?" Jin asked Wendy.

"Of course she's not sure!" Dom shouted angrily. "She's crazy!"

"Dom!" Kaylee yelled, glaring at him.

"She doesn't even know she's crazy!" Dom exclaimed. "It was dark. You were chased around by some kind of monster. I mean, how do you know this? What do you expect us to do with all of this?"

"I – I –" Wendy looked more upset than mad at him, "we need to go there and turn it off! Fred!"

Fred jumped and looked around like he expected there to be another Fred she was talking to.

"It's what's blocking the signal right? Isn't it?"

"Uh… um, possibly," Fred admitted.

"So, what, we're just gonna trek into the jungle again?" Dom asked, looking at the survivors. "Doesn't anybody remember what happens there?"

Kate nodded at the last sentence her brother said.

"Shut up, Dom! Stop being such a coward! Wendy yelled, she started to look a little wild… crazy, eyes big, nostrils flared. "Fred, your thing, the tria – whatever, didn't work. So – so, it's the best lead we got, right?" Wendy looked at Zidler. "Right?"

Zidler had thought everybody would be overjoyed, but hearing what the others had to say… But when he saw Wendy's gaze, he knew he would have to take a stand. "Wendy's right!" he said, Margo nodded in agreement, her hand still in his. "We can't just ignore this!"

"We can't get eaten – oh, wait," Dom said, looking horrified at himself, "we can!"

"Then you don't have to come!" Dom became silent at the loud scream Wendy made. She turned to the survivors, looking pleading. "Who does?"

Margo and Zidler raised their hands, Fred, looking unsure if he should raise his hand or say yes waved with his finger a little.

Wendy looked like someone had slapped her in the face, she turned around from all of them, and Zidler saw it before anybody else did – she was going to run away. Again.

But she stopped, they all did, as Libby and Fox were helping Kim out of the jungle, her white shirt was dark red – blood. And her face pale.

People rushed over to help, Margo too. Zidler turned to see where Wendy was – and of course, she was gone.

Then he saw she'd gone over to help Kim too.

**. .**

"Juliet?"

Flor shrugged at Ben's query. She didn't know Juliet's reasons, but she had her theories. Juliet wasn't like the others; she looked at Flor in a different way. She'd tried so hard to keep her alive, and Flor knew she owed that woman so much for it.

"Why would you shoot me when you could just as well blow us all up?" he asked, his back straight, staring at her, like he knew what she was thinking, but wanted her to say it out loud.

"Tell them not to hurt anyone," Flor said, nodding at the radio.

Ben didn't lift a finger.

"I'll kill you if you don't!" she cried out.

"No, you won't," Ben replied quickly. "You won't kill me. You're a killer, but not a murderer."

"Those are the same things – tell them. Tell them now!"

"_Ben_," it was a voice from the radio – it wasn't Juliet's, "_we got Shephard here. What shall we do?_"

"Tell them not to hurt him!"

Ben leaned forward. "Are you sure you don't want him to be hurt?"

"W-what…" She stared at the radio. "Just… tell them. Okay. T-tell them."

Ben picked the radio up slowly, putting it to his mouth. "Put Shephard on; make him tell her why he won't escape."

Flor's breath hitched, as Jack's voice came from the other end.

"_What do you want me to say?_"

"Just tell them what I told you," Ben said calmly.

"_I… they told me they would let me get off this island_."

Ben looked at Flor. "See? Now, Jack, tell why we keep Eva here."

"_They keep her here because otherwise she would get hurt – dead, like Rosalie._

"What about Boone and Brian?"

"_Boone and Brian, from what I've seen are with them, us, because that's the right thing to do. It's the best for everyone."_

"Owen?"

"_Owen… they want to help her. They want her to overcome her past."_

"Tell about all the people you've come to know_."_

"_There's this guy, Jim. He make all these jokes all the time, he tried to help everybody, even me, once, on the boat. He almost died – shot by Kim. I saved him… I'm glad I did. There's this man called Vincent, he takes care of all the children, tries to help them if they got trouble. He cares about them… And this woman… Felicity Hale, she just wants to save people. And then there's Jul –"_

The radio was shot into pieces by the gun in Flor's hand. They both stared at the broken pieces, somebody had to have realized what'd happened –

Flor knew it was over. Too soon. She wasn't ready. She wasn't. She couldn't just give in now. Not when there was so much left to do. But she buried her panic and turned the gun to Ben, who grabbed her wrist, and in the surprising pain at his grip she dropped the weapon.

Over.

"Ben?" they heard someone scream from outside. Ben let go of her hand, rolled over the floor to the window. He made some kind of signal; Flor didn't know what it was. She didn't care. Her hand was free and she reached for the gun, only to see that Ben already had it. Shakily, and slowly, Ben stood up on his feet.

Flor breathed out, tears welled up in her eyes. But she blinked them away. She waited for the final blow.

It never came.

"They won't barge in," Ben said, looking down at her. Flor was looking at the gun, everything was blurry. Not again. "They won't come in because I told them not to. Florence – you make it so hard to keep you alive." He was standing up, the wheelchair left behind.

Suddenly Flor saw that he was holding his hand out, to hers, for her to take it.

She didn't.

So Ben continued, "There's a back door, behind there's jungle. If I distract my people by coming out, you can make it. The code to the fence is now 8-9-6-5. Leave everything and go."

"Whatever I did," Flor said, whimpering, "to you. To make you want to save me. I regret it."

"8-9-6-5," Ben reminded her.

Flor stood up without his help. "How do I know you don't just want me to get shot in the head?"

"Trust me," he said honestly.

Flor looked down, at his hand.

She took it.

She then smashed her other fist in his jaw and kicked him on the leg so he fell. "I don't trust you!" she screamed and picked up the gun from the floor.

**. . **

"It's not that bad," Kim assured Libby. "It's just the stitches, right?"

"R-right," Libby said and glanced anxiously at Sun. "We'll just see when Andrea comes back. Don't overwork yourself. Don't go off into the jungle again, understand?"

"It's just the stitches," Kim mumbled to herself. She was in Hurley and Libby's shelter, and she was feeling a bit embarrassed at how everybody had immediately rushed to her side.

"I'm gonna see if I can find Fox," Hurley said and left.

Kim sighed. She wished she could go with him.

"Don't even think about it," Libby said.

**. .**

Jim stopped in his tracks, he held his breath – and heard someone else breathing close to him. He flattened his back against the wall, wondering if he should ask out loud if it was Garrett. But despite the small streams of light getting through the cracks, he couldn't even see the shape of a person in the tunnel around him.

He heard steps, clumsy, like the person was dragging their feet across the ground. Jim checked his knives, they were there. He carefully took one out.

He heard the steps close enough – and he knew he was supposed to see the person – but he couldn't. He wondered if he was supposed to make himself known.

Then he heard, without a mistake, the sound of the safety of a gun being released.

He didn't know what to do, he couldn't see whoever it was, he only had a few knives, and yet it sounded like it was coming from right in front of him.

He waited for the bang. There was a cool breeze – despite him being in sweat of the heat, he felt cold. The steps were gone. And he had a feeling whoever it had been, was gone too.

Jim warily stepped away from the dirty wall. When nothing happened, he continued on. But he kept a knife in his hand just in case.

It hadn't been Garrett. He was sure of that.

Who else was in the same tunnel as him?

Suddenly his foot slipped on something, he swore, regretting it immediately. Standing completely still, he listened – there was no sound other than his heart beating in his ears. He bent down to the ground and touched it. It was wet. It hadn't been there before. The smell… blood.

Whoever it was, was hurt.

**. . . .**

"Maddy…" Jim started, hesitating before continuing, "why are you here? Not that I mind finding pretty girls occupying my bed when I come home from work, but I prefer them with less clothes on."

Maddy threw one of his pillows at his face. She mumbled something and yawned, she had been sleeping… she was sleeping. She'd fallen asleep again.

Jim picked up the pillow she had thrown at him and threw it back at her head. She sat up immediately, seeing it was him, relaxing ever so slightly.

Jim sat down on the bed. "Maddy?"

"I had a quarrel with my da-d-Garrett and… and Liz…."

"Q-quarrel?" Jim saw the sad look in her eyes so he kept himself from laughing out loud. He cleared his throat. "A fight? Maddy, you have those all the time."

"This time was different," she said. "I do not wish to speak about it more."

She lay down on the bed again and took the pillow over her head. Jim sighed, knowing she wouldn't give in; he had to wait until morning then. He slipped into the covers at the other end of the bed, hoping he wouldn't have a nightmare this night…

**. . . .**

"I don't know what to do now," Milou whispered, almost so silent that Andrea didn't hear, but she did hear. Milou wasn't stripped bare, Andrea knew she still had orders left. But there was still a sense of hopelessness about her – she wasn't holding her head up with so much pride anymore.

They were close to the camp, and Andrea wasn't stopping now, she just slowed down and turned her head to look at the woman.

"You let it go," she said, and began to pick up her pace again, going through the jungle, stopping after a few steps to look over her shoulder once more. "Are you coming, then?"

Milou straightened her back, and Andrea didn't start walking again until they were side by side.

**. . **

Flor didn't make good decisions. She'd gotten engaged to the wrong person, married the wrong person, decided to catch a flight before calling the police, let the Others manipulate her, let a gun go off.

Somehow, even though she was carrying the weight of explosives, she'd just knocked out one of the most dangerous men alive, and there were blood-lusting people outside ready to kill her – she didn't put this one in the bad decision category. She'd tried. She'd tried at least. It was nowhere good enough. But it was better than nothing.

She took off her vest, and started to take off the explosives wrapped around her waist as quickly as she could.

She stopped when she heard screams from outside. She turned around and took two steps the window, not even thinking about what would happen if anybody saw her.

A hand grabbed her shoulder, holding her back. She tried to turn around.

"Calm down, Jane," Sawyer whispered in her ear. Flor's eyes widened and he let go of her shoulder. "We need to get to work."

Flor nodded shortly. "You can – can you – set it off?" she asked him as Sawyer placed the explosives in the corners of the house. He was halting, and when he turned around she saw a wound in his leg, it was bleeding hard and she couldn't believe he was standing up.

"Hell yeah, I can. And –" he said quickly when he saw Flor open her mouth "– we ain't got the time to talk now, all right?"

"You're hurt," Flor whispered.

"So is he." Sawyer nodded at Ben and smirked. "You ready to send all of this to hell?"

"But –" Flor began.

"No buts." He held out his hand. Flor stared at it in, frowned before looking up at him. Sawyer shook his head and took her hand.

They both turned around, loosing grip of each other's hands when they saw two people rush into the room.

"Back door," Jack said, looking around and then meeting Sawyer's eyes and clearly avoiding Flor's gaze. Juliet was with him. They were both panting, faces flushed, exhilarated like they had been in a fight.

"Doc – "Sawyer began.

"There will be time to explain later," Juliet said. "Right now you need to leave." Her eyes went to Ben lying on the ground. "Bonnie and Eva have gone, James," she said when she saw the disagreement in his look. "The back of the house is not free but if you tell them Ben is here…"

"We'll help you," Jack said.

Sawyer and Flor said nothing.

Jack took a step closer to them. "You have to trust me on this, Sawyer."

Sawyer nodded.

Two guards were keeping watch on the back door of the house.

Suddenly the back door flew open, and they saw Florence Bluth drag with her a man, as they were desperately trying to run away from the house.

"STOP!" One of the guards screamed when she saw them. But they didn't stop, instead they screamed at them.

"GET AWAY!" Florence Bluth shouted. Explosives. All going to blow up. Ben inside. She ordered the other guard to get them while she ran into the house to save their leader.

Flor fired her gun at the guard, and hit him on the arm. She gasped. She hadn't meant to hit. She saw people running towards them – no, towards the house. They couldn't be going there – she told them to get away.

And soon she could only see glimpses as they fled deeper into the jungle. She held onto Sawyer hard, afraid that he would slip away from her. Where was her gun? Had she dropped it? No, Sawyer had taken it. If he did –

The earth moved. An image of Jeremy flashed before her eyes. The ground shook underneath their feet. Dirt and dust filled every corner of their eyes. She was falling. _Fred_. All air was knocked out of her when she crashed into the ground. Her hand slipped away from Sawyer's. _Sean_. He'd slipped away from her. She couldn't speak, she couldn't hear but the ringing in her ears, for an eternity – a minute – she couldn't see anything either.

When the ringing faded she could hear screams far away, and she prayed that nobody had been hurt. That it were screams of shock, of finding Ben Linus safe and sound in the hidden underground basement. She even hoped it were screams anger that they had escaped. Just if no one had been killed…

She got up to her knees and elbows. Her arms shook so much she almost fell down again on the ground. But she bit down her teeth and turned her head to the side, looking over to where Sawyer lay. He was sprawled over the grass, next to a thin tree which branches bent down toward the ground. His eyes were closed.

"Sawyer?" Flor whispered, coughing immediately after his name. Sawyer didn't respond, but he opened his eyes, blinking rapidly. Almost looking like he wondered how he ended up there.

"Sawyer?" she repeated. "Sawyer, can you move?"

Sawyer closed his eyes again. She crawled over to his side – the background screams were now faint, and far away. They had time, little – but at least it was some.

"They did it," Flor continued, holding up her hand. It was scraped, trails of blood running down. She touched her face, she felt dizzy – but not like she had a wound there. "Bonnie got Eva. Eva's gone now, from them. We didn't do it, Sawyer. But it doesn't matter. She's okay."

But Claire wasn't. Flor had no idea what was happening to Brian right now – had they discovered he weren't really on their side after all? Or was he on their side, and had only tried to help Flor out of... out of what? Jack and Juliet had both stayed behind. And there were so many more. Flor wondered for a second how many more children the Others had taken.

"Sawyer, can you talk?" she asked, brushing his hair away from his face. She felt his pulse, it was steady. Good. He was alive. She looked over to his leg – and gasped. It was turned in a very uncomfortable angle. She swallowed. "Sawyer, can you… can you feel your leg?"

Sawyer grumbled something more that was lost to her ears.

"Sawyer, we need to go."

"I…" Sawyer lifted his head, and Flor helped him lean back against the tree.

"That kinds of looks bad." Flor waved her bloody hand at his leg. Sawyer looked like he wanted to chuckle, but it ended up as a grimace.

"I hadn't – hadn't noticed." His breaths came out in shirt wheezes. "You – Eva, you were saying…"

"What you were saying earlier," Flor replied. "We need to go now. It's just a matter of time before they find us. Their fence is going to be up at any second."

"In case you haven't noticed, Florence Night –" he coughed. He lowered his eyes. "I'm not goin' anywhere."

Flor looked down too; she still had a hand on Sawyer's shoulder. She saw that he still held the gun in his left hand. "Okay."

Sawyer coughed even more. "Glad we agree."

Flor blinked back the tears, her voice shook when she said, "Then I'll carry you."

"Very cute…" Sawyer's half-smile faded, as his eyes widened. Flor didn't even have to look over her shoulder to know someone was there. She let go of his shoulder and got up to her feet, before she turned around to face their watcher.

She met the man's green-blue eyes, but looked away – and saw that he wasn't carrying any weapons but a notebook in his hand. He almost looked like he was a part of the forest around them. And she also recognized him – he was an Other.

It would seem like it was two against one – but that wasn't the case. Not with how Flor was trembling and with how Sawyer could barely speak. It was an unfair match.

Flor looked around at the trees but there didn't seem to be anyone more with him.

"Just let us go!" she cried out. He hadn't said a word. And he didn't say anything now either. But he ripped out a piece of paper from his notebook, and held it up for her to see.

_I AM HERE TO GUIDE YOU_

"Guide? Help? Us?" Flor looked back at Sawyer. His eyes were closed. She wondered if his pulse was as steady as before. They needed help. He needed help to survive.

The man shook his head. He pointed at the _YOU_.

"Me?" Flor's legs were shaking, but she took a step forward. "I don't –" he had to already know she would never trust one of them. But was he really one of the Others? "You have to help him! He's – he's hurt! His leg is…"

He scribbled something else down.

_ONLY YOU_

"I don't… I don't understand…" Sawyer made a noise behind her, sounding almost like a plead. She went down to her knees again, reaching out a hand towards him. Her back was against the man.

Sawyer's arm went around her and he fired once, twice, trice, but only one bullet had reached its target. The gun was empty. And the man hadn't even screamed as his leg had been pierced.

Sawyer dropped the gun. Flor swayed on the spot. Sawyer managed to catch her before she fell.

Minutes later they were on the other side of the fence, and a long time later when they finally dared to – had to – rest, Sawyer looked at Flor and said, "It's strange isn't it?"

Everything had been strange that day.

"Even after Rosalie's death, that freighter girl's…"

Naomi. Her name had been Naomi.

"Not even I could figure out how someone like you went from such an innocent thing to a murderer."

Innocent?

"But I guess you always had it in you."

The Others had been right.

"Just look at today."

_One month. _

"And now we're here. Two murderers. One dying and one hunted."

Flor looked up when he said, "What will we do now?"

**. .**

The tunnel began to slant up; cracks in the walls and roofs streamed some light in. Jim wasn't sure how, as he still had to be underground, but he accepted it as another mystery of the island. Jim's stomach was making itself known, but he had drunk water earlier before and he'd gone more days without much food than this.

He blinked hard, looking up, slowing down pace. The light grew stronger, he blinked, couldn't quite understand it. He was standing still – no, swaying. The edges in his vision blurred together. The light… it was kind of beautiful, white, no hints of clouds… it was as if the cracks in the sky were bleeding white and the white was stunning. He couldn't look away from it. The memory, the thought that someone else was there with him, Garrett, Maddy, it all faded away from his mind until they were nothing else than an irritation to what the white was – the white that was everything. He lifted his fingers, his hand, his arm… just to touch the light. He needed the light.

He blinked.

Dark again.

He shivered, the whole moment before, it had been surreal. This was real. The cold…

How could it be cold?

Jim turned around, completely forgetting himself, his breaths were light in his ears. He couldn't feel his legs. Too cold.

He slowly bent his knees until he was sitting on the ground. He couldn't see. He could see – the tunnel's walls and the cracks in the surface but it was all shaking underneath him around him. Oh freaking Jesus Christ the cave was going to collapse on him. He breathed hard and fast but he couldn't stand up, too weak.

Everything was shaking, slipping away from him, he was falling. His heart clenched. His lungs broke. _He couldn't breathe_. He desperately tried to suck air into his lungs. His throat was closed. His hands were sweating – wet, blood. He couldn't breathe. He was dying. He was going to die. Cave collapsing on him. Heart attack. Dying of a heart attack. Something wet ran down his nose onto the ground that he was falling into – from – still falling.

The light disappeared and something dark was in front of his eyes.

"I'm dying," Jim wheezed out between trying to breathe. "I'm dying. Can't breathe. Am dying. Gar - Garret

**. . . .**

"Liz threatened to leave," Maddy said when they were having breakfast together in the bed because Jim didn't believe tables were necessary to enjoy delicious food, neither were plates. "Again. Garrett went mad in his usual way, by not showing a streak of emotion. I… what's the term…"

"Snapped? Freaked out? Went ballistic?" Jim helped her out between eating his toast.

"I told her I hated her," Maddy said, looking ashamed.

"So you did what every teenager has."

Maddy looked confused. "I am not a teenager."

"You could just as well be," Jim told her in all honesty.

"Then she said… she said she felt remorse."

"Okay, all good, you patched things up?"

Maddy shook her head. "No, she said she had regrets about… about ever taking me here."

Jim stopped eating, which, for him, was quite the success. "Oh."

"She was right, Jim. I do not belong here."

Jim took a deep breath. "That's…"

"She is leaving now, and… and… I do not believe she will return. And then I will be with an absent… moth…" She stopped herself. "And you will have an absent father."

"Maddy…"

"I don't care about this anymore. I don't care about the island. Jim, sometimes it feels like I do not care about you, Karl, Fox or anyone else either."

Maddy went back to her house, as she always did, but she was right. Liz did leave.

**. . . .**

"Do you really believe Wendy's idea is right?" Margo asked Fred. Kim was back in her tent., getting taken care of by Andrea. Fox looked devastated, supposedly because her wound was infected and it was his fault. Margo had walked over and sat down beside him to take moment of peace from the stress of the camp. It was dark except for the bonfires burning, and she felt exhaustion in her shoulders and back, still, she stayed up.

Fred nodded. "Yes, I do."

"Then why won't you just say so?" Margo asked. Fred didn't explain it to her. She took a moment to calm herself down, but she didn't. "Did you know this all along?"

Fred turned to her, looking into her eyes. "You still don't trust me?"

Margo sighed. "I'm going to get all serious with you know, I don't like to say this. But I have to, I guess." She sat down next to him again and took a deep breath.

"Maybe it's because we are afraid to trust you. Because trusting you gives one hope. And then shattering that bright hope to pieces will be worse than thousand knives in one's heart." She looked down at her feet that she'd now buried back in the sand again. "I can't even imagine what will happen to me if I don't get off this island. Or worse," she looked over to the jungle, thinking of everyone scattered out there in the unknown.

"What will happen if we leave someone behind."

**. .**

**Author's Notes:** I'm back. _In black._

Happy Holidays!

Namaste.


	51. This Simple Feeling

Beyond.

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 42, This Simple Feeling**

**. .**

Fox was sitting by Kim's side in the tent, their hands were close together, but didn't touch.

"They already know how to get us rescued," Kim whispered. She blinked, her eyes closing for just a moment too long before she looked up at him again. Her mouth was open just a little like she had trouble breathing just right, her lips were pale. Her hand (the one close to Fox) was shivering a little. She had heard the news. "You were too late."

Fox shook his head. He looked down at her with worry, worry she didn't miss. "No, K-kim, they don't know."

She frowned, shifting. "What do you mean?"

"I – I mean that there is something else blocking the signal too."

The revelation hung between them in the air. Kim's hand stopped shaking.

"W-what?" Kim stuttered in a very similar way to Fox.

He took a shivering breath. "There's another D-dharma s-station, down…. down in the water and…"

"T-tomorrow. Tell them tomorrow," Kim said softly.

Fox nodded. "I – I will."

Kim felt worse about what Fox would have to do, than the pain in her stomach, but she didn't show it.

Their hands were still very close together, but further apart than in the beginning.

Fox sat there beside her in what had to be the most awkward silence in history of awkward silences, until he mumbled a goodbye, stood up and made some jerky motions that must be how Fox walked.

"Fox!" she called out before she could regret it. He turned around. She opened her mouth, stuttering out incoherent words until she said, "C-can you… someone needs to watch over me… just in case…" She tried not to sound too hopeful.

Fox took a step towards her. "Of co–"

"Kim!" Fox was rudely pushed aside when a blonde little hurricane known as Andrea came over to her side. Andrea put a hand on her forehead. "Kim, how are you feeling?" she asked.

"B-better."

Andrea snorted and began to roll up her shirt to take a look at the bandages. Kim lifted her head a little to see if Fox was still there.

He wasn't.

**. .**

It was an unspoken agreement between them.

Flor would take care of Sawyer's leg wound the best she could, with the little knowledge they both had picked up from their time on the island.

While Flor tried to clean the pieces of clothing in the small stream to put a new bandage on the wound, they would not speak of how Sawyer had said he would kill her when all of this was over.

When Flor came back to their little hiding-place by the large tree with fresh fruit, they wouldn't talk about whether or not those at the beach had enough to fill their stomachs.

When Sawyer's fever was getting up, they didn't talk about Eva. When Sawyer's fever was going down and Flor cried of relief, they didn't talk about Jack, Juliet or Sean.

In fact, very little was said between the two of them, except when their topic reached this particular topic:

To return.

"We can't go back."

"Yeah, I _know_."

"It's for everyone's safety. They're… they're after me."

"They're safer without ya. Yeah, I know, Cap'n Obvious."

"Bonnie… Eva… Sean…"

"Everybody."

"It could be possible… we blew their houses up. They might not have so many resources…"

"Still they infiltrated us. Got some sort of seer knowledge of the future."

"We have to stay out there, to be sure."

They never talked of how long.

Flor stayed up keeping watch and now and then she would stare at Sawyer, softly leaning closer to make sure he was still breathing.

This was how they had it now.

**. .**

The music playing on the stereo changed to a much louder song Owen hadn't heard before, and by "hadn't heard before" she meant "hearing it every damn time there was a radio or a stereo close by". It was one of those new pop-singers' crap.

She quickly shut it off, looking worried at the all too impending silence. But there was only the sound of the car running, the wheels against the silence. She relaxed in her seat, blinking, keeping her eyes closed a little too long. She opened them, and when she looked in the rear view window there was another car behind her. She gripped the steering wheel tighter, knuckles turning white, nails digging in. Her breath got caught in her throat when she saw the driver in the other car. The car was too close. She looked forward at the open road in front of her. She let go of the wheel. And threw herself at the other seat. Everything around her became a tornado and she screamed and it –

"Bad dream?"

Owen opened her eyes, panting, she was holding onto the mattress with her hands. She looked up and saw a nurse by the bed.

The nurse smiled and said, "Your manager is here to see you."

Owen's eyes widened as she looked at the door into the room. It opened, her hands clenched. She felt the panic rise inside her chest once again.

"Tina," Owen whispered to her new manager, breathing out in relief.

"Could you leave us alone for just a minute?" Tina said to the nurse with a pleasant and practiced smile. The nurse left and Tina turned her dark brown eyes back to Owen's. Tina looked as professional as ever, pantsuit and perfectly black hair falling in waves.

"Was it the car accident this time?" she asked with what could be concern, if you didn't know better.

"What do you want?" Owen snapped. She sat up in the bed.

"Aw, come on, Owen. It's the day you're finally getting out of here. Had you forgot? The hospital is releasing you. Won't that put a smile on your face?"

Owen's lips didn't even twitch.

"I suppose not," Tina muttered. "Right, the press is outside. So you're gonna get cleaned up and then you're gonna make a statement and girl, you're gonna be happy 'bout it."

She sat down in a plastic chair and crossed her legs, her high heels mocking Owen who was practically at the same level.

"Now remember the media has no freakin' idea what really happened in that car crash," Tina continued, "or why you've been off the scene for one and a half year. Well, they know why you were gone six months after that crash but nothing before that. So you're gonna tell them just what I have been telling them. That you were on your way on a comeback when that drunk driver crashed into your car and that's why you have oh, so tragically been away. You're gonna say you miss your fans and you miss the stage and that despite the rehab you will be going through because of your arms your vocal cord is still working just fine and dandy."

"So I'm gonna tell 'em a load of crap then?" Owen said.

"Yeah you are."

"We've talked about this. Tina –"

"Yes we have," Tina interrupted her sharply. "And we both came to the conclusion that there is not enough evidence, that there is no reason for you to stay in hiding and that you got a damn pretty smile once you curl your lips up."

Owen looked away, biting her lip. She watched the drop in her arm.

She heard Tina move closer to the chair. With a much gentler voice Tina said, "Owen, I know six months ain't enough. I know you need way more than that. A lifetime to recover from this. But you don't have time."

"Yeah, he made sure of that," Owen spat, still not looking at her.

"This is what you want. This is what you need – for everything to go back the way it was. Your fans still love you. Hell, they're gonna create havoc if they don't get to see you sing soon. You will be announcing a new album and your next concert is already planned in Japan, and then you'll get a nice break in Australia, Sydney, before you take L.A. by storm. And you will be telling the press that?"

Owen nodded.

"But if you can't, if you feel like you're going to have another breakdown you just nod to me, right?"

"And if I see another car trying to run me over?" Owen whispered.

Tina didn't answer that, she called back the nurse and Owen began the preparations.

The singer Owen Chauncey was back.

**. . . .**

"What the hell do you mean we're leaving?"

Owen's hands clenched, nails digging into her palms as she met Juliet's gaze.

"I mean you have fifteen minutes getting yourself ready before we're off."

"Why –"

"I do not think you are in any position to be asking why, Owen," Juliet snapped, turning around and walking out of the open door of Owen's house. Outside, Owen could see people already carrying their bags with them as they assembled on the outskirts of the community.

Owen took only a moment before she hurried into her bedroom. There were still shattered glass spread over the floor and it didn't look like anyone was going to take care of it now.

She grabbed a bundle of clothes and stuffed it inside a small duffel bag before going back into her kitchen. Making sure no one was peering into one of the windows watching her; she packed in a kitchen knife too.

She was almost considering making a run for it when she walked out on her porch. Then she saw that Juliet had not left after all, but was waiting for her by a tree close to her house. Owen didn't acknowledge Juliet's existence, but walked by her and followed the people walking away from their homes.

She caught sight of Vincent, looking still like he'd been in a bloody fight without having any wounds. She saw Shreyans and Felicity walking together, huddled close. She'd heard good ol' Claret had beaten him up. The rumors were flying faster than the wind amongst the Others.

She heard someone pant slightly behind her, and saw blonde hair and realized Juliet was catching up to her. Owen stopped abruptly, almost making Juliet crash into her. She regained her grace in the last second and avoided the doomed collision course.

"What's going to happen with 'em?" Owen asked her, throwing her a condescending glance.

"Who do you mean?" asked Juliet.

"Who do you think?" Owen answered just as bluntly."The prisoners. I don't suppose you can just drag them with ya wherever we're going."

"On the contrary," a new voice said, Owen turned and saw Richard walk up to the two of them, "we can."

Owen looked at him and he met her eyes with his own. She nodded curtly and turned her attention to the scene before her.

A few of the Others had already begun moving, but she could see Locke (her stomach made an odd twist at the sight of him) speaking with Ben. It looked like they were arguing.

Ben began to walk away from him, walking stick in his hand. On his neck was a large bruise from when (according to the rumors) Florence Bluth had thrown him to the floor. How he had survived the explosion of his house was beyond her – Jacob, island's magical interference (or the most popular theory: the basement.)

Locke turned around when he saw them get closer. Owen tried to avoid catching his eye – but it didn't work very well. She was, after all, very eye-catching.

Locke said nothing, but his eyes did. He looked almost frightened, desperate. Owen hoped her eyes didn't tell what she was feeling, because it was rising to panic in what she was facing. The Others didn't look at her like they had done when she had first arrived there. Now they looked at her with suspicion instead of curiosity, doubt instead of hope.

When they were far away from Locke, far away enough so he wouldn't hear her, Owen turned to Richard.

"Where is Lalah?"

"Lalah," Richard said, frowning like he hadn't heard the name before. "Oh, Lalah."

"Why do you want to know that?" Juliet asked from her other side.

"Because I want to talk to the woman of course!" Owen responded. She turned back to Richard, who was now gazing out over the green hills. What did it take to get his bloody attention? She looked back to Juliet.

"Lalah's still not well," Juliet answered with a sigh, despite her calm voice Owen could clearly see she was avoiding looking at her. She was lying. "What happened to her..."

"Yes, what exactly did happen?" What Owen meant was: She's not here anymore, is she?

Juliet turned silent for a moment. "I'm sure you already know everything. Don't you, Chauncey?"

"What?" Owen snapped a little too unkindly, but Juliet's eyes looked cold, well, colder than they usually did.

"What she means," Richard said, getting back in the conversation as surprisingly as ever, "is that many here are certain that you knew everything that occurred that day Eva fled."

"And how the hell could I know that? It wasn't like I was looking into my magic glass ball or anything..."

"Owen," Juliet sighed, "think for a second, be quiet and think."

"Oh," Owen said when she breathed out. "Right. Yeah, obviously."

Richard made a sound that sounded like a snort. Their eyes met for a moment before he looked away again.

"I suppose I should feel flattered," Owen continued.

Juliet raised her eyebrows.

"That you believe I can be at like, hundred places at once and risk my life to save some dimwitted harried people from oh, comfy beds and food! And you really must think highly of me, if you think I would actually try to help someone like Flor, Sawyer and Sean –"

"You were upset over his condition," said Richard.

"Were or pretended?" Owen snapped back, and hastened her pace until she walked side by side with Felicity and that military guy Shreyans.

**. .**

"I'm going to tell them, now. Uh, i-if you're up to i-it?" Fox looked at Kim a bit nervously, as if he expected her to fall apart under his hand on her shoulder at any second now.

Kim smiled, trying to blink back those darn tears that threatened to fall. She put a hand over his hand, tried not to winch at the stung in her stomach. "Of course I am," she said.

"There's things," Fox said hurriedly, "things I-I haven't told you, even –"

"It's okay," Kim assured him.

"N-no, some of those things, you will a-all hate me. I know, I j-just need you to know –"

"Fox," Kim said a little more fiercely, a little louder, "really, it's okay. Who we were before this..." She looked down. "It doesn't matter. Who we are. That... that's what is important."

Fox still looked like he wanted to tell her more, but Kim wasn't sure she really wanted to know. Maybe it was selfish of her – stupid, to want to keep this - this image of Fox. But it was also about giving him a fresh start.

"I will be there in the crowd," she said, echoing past words uttered to her, and she let go of his hand, and let him help her up to her feet, and together they walked to what would be Fox's judgment day.

**. .**

"Dom?" Kaylee bent down to peer into the half-made shelter where Dom was currently looking through all their belongings. At her voice he froze, turning his head to the side so he could see her without actually looking at her.

"Um, not not, Kay. M'busy," he mumbled, hoping for her to walk away.

Kaylee stayed put. "Dom, we need to talk."

"Later," Dom replied.

Kaylee crept into the shelter. "No, now."

Dom quickly fled the scene, but Kaylee was ready. He had done this several times before the last days, always escaping, and if anyone was a professional at escaping it was Kaylee Ann Evans.

She grabbed the sleeve of his shirt so he slowed down, and ran up to his side, both of them throwing up sand in their way.

"Kay, I said I was busy," Dom said, still not looking at her.

Kaylee threw her hair back, and stared angrily at his vacant eyes as they both half-running made their way over the beach. "Too busy to talk to me?"

"Yes."

"Dom –"

"Kay."

Kaylee sighed. "Dom, you have to tell me what the hell that outburst was about. With Wendy. Okay? You don't usually –"

Dom stopped so abruptly Kaylee took several steps before she stopped too. Dom was now heading back the way they came, still almost jogging. Kaylee wasn't having any of that and hurried her pace until she was beside him again.

"How's it gonna happen then?" she snapped, panting.

"What? Kay, I said I was bu –"

"Does the freighter sink?" she asked. "Do I get eaten by a polar bear? C'mon, Dom. If I know then it's easier for me to avoid it."

Dom actually chuckled, shaking his head. "No, Kay. It won't get easier."

"So something happens then?" she replied sharply.

He swallowed, lowering his gaze to the ground. "Nothing happens, okay?" For the first time he turned to look at her, and he smiled, a smile that looked more like a grimace or a drug-induced nerve reaction than a real smile.

"Fine." Now it was Kaylee who stopped in her steps. "If you don't want to talk to me about this willingly, if I'm not... Fine."

She turned around and walked in a quick pace back to the camp, shoulders crossed and deaf to the small "Kaylee" Dom said when she left.

**. .**

"An announcement to make?" Andrea said, sounding very tired. "Everyone's making announcements these days. Dom just made an announcement that he was going to kill himself if we dared to go to that radio tower, Wendy made an announcement about the day before and that guy Frogurt or whatever made an announcement this morning that he wanted everyone to take 'extra super special care' of the traps and I heard Hurley and Libby were going to make an announcement and... oh, hi, Kim." Andrea's whole expression changed and she smiled wildly. "Wait..." she said, looking at the both of them. "You aren't going to say you're..."

Fox and Kim stared at her in confusion. "What?" Kim said.

"Never mind," Andrea sighed. "Is it very important?"

"Very."

"Does it involve us getting off the island?"

"Y-yes."

"Does it involve flying unicorns?"

"W-what?"

"Zidler's announcement," Andrea explained and everyone understood. "Does it?"

"No."

"All right then, what's the announcement about?"

Fox was silent so Kim ever so smooth elbowed him. ""Tell her."

"Well... uh... I'm... a-a-a –"

"Fox is an infiltrator from the Others," Kim said.

Fox and Andrea stared at her. Andrea looked at Fox who was whiter in the face than she'd ever seen him before. She threw her head back and laughed.

"Good one, Kimmy," she said, shaking her head. "I needed that. Now you should go back to lying down and resting so you don't rip out your intestines again by walking."

Fox looked at Kim with pleading eyes.

"No, that does not count as telling," said Kim.

"So, Fox is an Other?" Andrea raised her eyebrows, wanting to take a part in their little game. "They sent their village idiot then?"

"Andy!" Kim shouted.

Andrea shrugged. "Sorry." She didn't look sorry at all. "I might have needed that laugh, but the fact remains that we do not have time for this, not when there's a mission to get us all off this bloody rock going on."

"We c-can't get away from here," Fox said.

"I think we can," Andrea replied.

He shook his head. "We can't, b-because there is a-another transmitter disturbing e-everything that comes in and o-out of this island. It's located in a D-dharma s-s-s-station called Through the L-looking glass."

"Is this a joke? How do you know that?" Andrea looked from Fox to Kim as for an explanation.

"Because I have been on this island for many y-years," Fox said.

**. .**

"Wendy." Wendy looked up and saw Margo stand above her, hair put up in the usual ponytail.

"Hi," Wendy replied, picked up the basket with the little hopefully-not-too-ruined-fruit from the jungle she'd just dropped. She glanced at Margo's stomach, couldn't help it.

Margo hurried to keep Wendy's pace. "Have Andrea talked to you about –?"

Wendy nodded. "Yeah, we're leaving as soon as possible, some are a little against the idea." She looked over to further down the beach where Dom and Kaylee were involved in a weird chasing game, none of them looked too happy though.

Margo followed her gaze, and looked a little pale as she turned her concentration back to Wendy again. "Wendy, are you feeling all right? Are you –"

"Fred," Wendy said, interrupting both Margo and Zidler and Fred's conversation. "Help me with these." She dumped the basket in his arms.

"Err, all right." Fred looked a little surprised. Wendy left the new diner table quickly before Margo could start talking to her again.

"Wendy's acting weird," Zidler said out loud to no one in particular.

Margo looked thoughtful. "It's a simple feeling, guilt. Right?"

"Right…" Zidler said, grinning, but he also looked after Wendy, who was now trying to avoid a conversation with Desmond. "The sooner we get off this place the better, right, Fred?"

Fred nodded in agreement, turning the fruits in the basket with a suspicious look on his face. "You sure this isn't poisonous?"

**. . **

Flor woke up to a gray sky and a dry throat. After checking that the sleeping Sawyer was just sleeping and not dead, she walked as quietly as she could away from him and down to the small stream. She water looked murky in the absence of the light, and shed just cupped her hands to drink when she noticed something lying on the opposite shore.

It was a dead rabbit. She let the water in her hands drip away when she saw the blood and the flesh down in the water coloring it red. There was no way they could drink from the stream now.

She woke Sawyer up and they came to the conclusion that one: they had one bottle of water left, two: they had to get moving and three: Sawyer was very capable of moving on his own thank you very much despite the fever that had returned.

"Do you know where we are?" Sawyer asked Flor when they took a break by a large rock, the shadow doing little to cool them from sweating out the little water they had left.

"How could I know?" Flor asked him.

Sawyer made an attempt at shrugging. "Seein' as you're the one who've been runnin' 'round these parts of the woods..."

Flor shook her head. "I don't know where we are. I... I have no clue."

"No kiddin'," Sawyer muttered.

Flor glowered at him, to her surprise she saw that Sawyer was smiling.

"What?" she asked, a bit gentler in her tone.

"Figures we're gonna blow up all the Others' home, makin' the first real move on our side just to die out here of thirst. But who knows? Maybe it'll rain, judging by the sky. Island's always been fickle 'bout that, hasn't it?"

"We're not going to –" Flor stopped herself. They weren't going to die? How the hell could she know that? The ratio on whether or not they were going to survive leaned pretty heavily onto the YOU WILL DIE part. "We might."

Sawyer nodded. "We might."

They had a silent moment of understand each other, which was broken when Sawyer clamped his hand over Flor's mouth. Flor made a shocked sound.

"Shhh," Sawyer said, putting a finger to his lips. "You hear that? That's someone walkin'. You're breathing too loudly." He put his hand away.

"And you aren't talking too loudly?" Flor said too loudly.

They both turned silent when they heard whoever it was behind that rock take another step. Flor and Sawyer stared at each other, hearing the shuffling of feet, realizing that whoever it was had climbed up on the rock.

They looked up.

"Soyaaa!" Little Ellie shouted happily, clapping her eyes and promptly falling down from the rock, luckily Flor caught her.

She shrugged at the look on Sawyer's face. Ellie in her arms laughing. "You should've seen Jeremy on sugar."

**. . **

Jim heard the sound of dripping water. He opened his eyes slightly and saw a red flower with heart shaped leaves – an Anthurium – just by his side. He smiled a little.

He sat upright when everything that'd happened came back to him. Diane dead, Lalah shot. Following Garrett, the light, the cave collapsing. He looked around and saw Garrett walk over to his side. His face was dirty but his hands were clean when they touched Jim's forehead.

"The fever's gone," he said to himself.

"F-fever." It felt like Jim had slept for an hour. "How... the cave..."

"That was a hallucination. The cave did not collapse."

Jim looked around, his eyes unconfused when he turned back to look at the man. "You..."

"Am quite real." Garrett sat down.

"How long was I out?" Jim touched his forehead on the same place Garrett had put his hand.

"First you slept for twelve hours…" Garrett sighed and wiped away some dirt of his pants, "then you were awake for three before you passed out again."

"W-what?" No wonder his throat was so dry. "I don't remember..."

"The less you remember of this place, the better," said Garrett grimly. He seemed very concerned with everything but Jim, which, well, wasn't unusual.

"O-okay. So amnesia equals good in this scenario?"

Garrett looked bemused at Jim's attempt of being funny. "This is no 'joke'," he said. "You have to tell me everything you remember."

"I... the light, of course..." That weird light, he missed it, for some reason he wanted to see it again. He needed it. "And then there was... uh, the cave collapsing, but that wasn't real, right? And I saw... there was this person. And there was blood. Was that you?"

"No. That was not me."

"Who was it then?" Jim asked.

Garrett walked over to the stream, and came back with a large leaf filled with some water. "Drink," he said. "You will need this for our journey."

Jim drank, and then looked back at him, eyes big. "You mean we're going back in there – into the caves?"

Garrett nodded. "We are."

**. .**

The Others set up camp by what looked like some ruins, located on a large valley. Owen looked up and saw Richard sit up on a hillside. It was a long way to go (for Owen), a way she wasn't ready to take just yet. Instead she looked through all the tents and all the people to find that one person. Her gaze settled on a figure disappearing behind one of the tents. She stopped in her steps and blinked. A shiver running though her as she had felt recognition

"Owen."

She turned around and saw Ben, without any regard to who he was and what he had said to her – she asked him the question she needed the answer to so much.

"Where is Claire?"

"Do you want to see her?" he asked.

Owen rolled her eyes. "No, I just wanted to know where she was so I could avoid seeing her – of course I do! I want to know where she is." Owen almost asked about Lalah too, but if her suspicions were correct, Lalah wasn't there anymore.

Ben nodded slowly. "Okay, let's make a deal. I will let you see Claire, if you do what you came here to do."

"You mean kill that man who has done nothing?" asked Owen, but even to her the words sounded flat.

"Convince Claire to take her son to us," Ben explained.

"Yeah, because that worked so well," she said sarcastically.

Ben took a step closer to her. "I have realized that too much has happened for Claire to be convinced in a way I would like to –"

Owen snorted. "You mean manipulated to."

Ben made a half-smile. "We need to be harsher on her. I see that now. What is the most powerful tool to convince someone with?"

"Guns?" Owen suggested.

He shook his head. "People."

"Guns don't kill people, people do," she muttered to herself.

**. . . .**

Owen looked at herself in the mirror. Her hair had now purple streaks in it, and she was finally out of that sodding hospital gown. She didn't look like she used to in her old days, but she _didn't_ look sick and she _did_ look like a woman making her way back. Makeup covered the dark rings under her eyes and the red spots in her skin and she was confident that she could walk with a back straight enough so people wouldn't notice her limp.

There was a knock on the bathroom door.

"What?" Owen shouted.

"Your father called!" Tina shouted through the door.

Owen opened it, and stared. "And?"

"I told him the same thing you told me to say when he did." Tina sighed. "You sure you don't want to call him up?"

"I want you to stop taking calls for me."

Tina put the cell phone in her hand. "All right, then you can do it yourself." She walked away, Owen heard her shout from the hall, "Be ready in ten minutes!"

Owen didn't smile, but her lips did twitch when she was reminded of the reason why she hired Tina.

She walked back into the bathroom. She did look gorgeous after all. Hell, she was even better. A smile began to spread on her face when the phone rang, she answered it without thinking. Whoever it was, the press or her father, she could tell them to screw themselves with a smirk on her face.

"Chauncey," she said sweetly. "Owen Chauncey."

"Owen," said a voice she knew very well. "Hey, it's been way too long –"

She shut off the phone and dropped it in the sink. She fled out the door, running barefoot out of her room.

"Tina!" she shouted, looking around. A nurse saw her and began to walk towards her; Owen turned around and picked up her pace, walking through the corridor, past the recovering patients and away from that nurse.

His words were ringing in her ears. _Been way too long. Been way too long._ She saw an elevator, a man was stepping inside and she followed him without thinking, just wanting to get away.

"Where are you going?" he asked. He had wrinkles in his face and a wrinkled hand that gestured towards the buttons.

"The exit," Owen breathed out.

He looked a bit confused, and Owen avoided looking at him as they went down the levels to the main floor.

"The parking's underground, right?" Owen said suddenly.

"Why, yes, but…"

Owen pressed the button to the garage.

"I am an escapee from the mental ward," Owen explained, nodding frantically.

The man chuckled, thinking it was a joke, which it was, but Owen wasn't going to let him believe that.

"I have to kill the Wicked Witch of the East and anyone who laughs at my epic quest," Owen said very seriously, feeling her heart rate go down. The panic slowly sinking, the pain in her right leg rising.

"T-that's nice," he said and practically ran out from the elevator.

Owen reached the bottom level and walked out. The asphalt almost burned against her toes. She tried not to think of the connection of this asphalt to the other one, the one under the wheels as she had been driving…

She began to walk, past all the cars, her breath getting more and more frenetic. She limped slightly as she carefully walked up to the open air and away from the road.

It was outside the back of the hospital. She could see a few reporters standing over by a park bench discussing wildly between them, maybe they were thinking of sneaking in.

Owen tried to sneak too, over the grass and past the trees.

"That's her!" she heard the redheaded woman with the film camera shout. Owen attempted to run but fell down, her leg giving up. She was wincing on the ground when they reached her.

One of them, the one with a pen and a notepad helped her up, all while they were talking rapidly with each other about the best way to get a story out of the situation.

"Give me your phone," Owen interrupted them.

The redheaded woman looked shocked. "W-what?"

"Let me put it this way: if you give me your cell I will give you an interview if you don't I will rip your head off."

The woman gulped, and quickly handed Owen her cell phone.

"Film this," the man said to the woman, meanwhile the young blond guy held out his voice recorder.

"No taping or filming until I am done with this phone call, all right?" Owen hissed, staring at the voice recorder guy. He gulped too.

Owen turned away from them, dialing the number fast. "Hello," she said when the other line picked up.

"_Owen? Where the hell are you? Why the hell was the cell phone in the sink?_" Tina shouted, Owen had been right; she had gone back and picked it up.

"Because I put it there," Owen said. "And I am outside the hospital. Look, he called me!"

"Who is _he?_" the redheaded woman asked.

_Head. Ripped. Off_. Owen mouthed to her. "He called me on your number. Okay, he is close. I know it. He's watching me. I had to get out. I will meet you –"

"_Owen!_" Tina shouted. "_Now you stop, okay? Breathe in through your nose and out. And then you will get your scrawny ass right back here in this hospital room the way you got out so no reporters will see you. And then we will talk this through nice and slowly _–"

"You don't believe me!" Owen shouted. "It was him! You don't understand, Tina!" Owen felt close to tears. And she was close to reporters. She had a moment of painful reality hit her when she realized what deep trouble she was in, but she pushed it away because she couldn't deal with reality at the moment. "All right. I'll come back I just have to make an interview first. But it was _him_, Tina. It was Sven. And now he's gonna do the job done for good."

**. . . .**

"I'd prefer to tell everyone..." Fox said again, but Andrea was deaf to all he was saying.

She grabbed his wrist, checking that nobody was looking their way before she leaned in, practically growling."You tell me now."

"Andy," Kim tried, also looking around. They were on the edge of the camp, by the trees. "Andy, please."

"You cannot create havoc, by admitting this to everyone..." Andrea almost looked mad. Fox winced as her grip turned even harder.

"Andy!" Contrary to Kim's desperate tone, she put a gentle hand atop of Andrea's on Fox's wrist. "He will explain everything, okay? He... he isn't with them anymore but he can tell us so much more, please just don't hurt him!"

"I want to do much more than hurt him, if this - if this is true!" Andrea let go of his wrist though, Kim's hand lingered on hers for a moment before she let go too.

Andrea stood up, looking down on the both of them. "You know what, Fox? I already suspected it. I knew something was wrong with a screw in your head from the moment I met you. Now I know what it was. And I just –" She gestured wildly with her hand in frustration. "I'm so bloody glad that you're letting them all slay you willingly." She picked out the gun she always kept on her, and Kim couldn't help but cry out. "Insurance. That you won't try to flee like the coward you are, Fox, now that I know the truth."

"Andy –"

"Shut up, Kim. I don't think –" Andrea took a deep, shaky breath. "You're no better than him. You were with me - us, at the other side of this bloody rock and you..." She shook her head.

"Up with you," she waved with the gun, "both of you."

They did as she said, and she pointed the gun at the both of them until Hurley and Libby saw them and shouted.

**. .**

Ellie led Sawyer (who managed a smile despite his pain) and Flor (who managed a smile despite the mention of her son) back to what she said was her new beach. Her new beach was not a beach, but a clearing that neither Flor nor Sawyer had seen before. It was just by a hill, hidden behind rocks and large trees and it looked from the outside like you couldn't possibly get closer to the mountain side without falling or tripping, but Ellie moved away a couple of branches and they saw a steep little way leading down.

She skipped before them, falling down on the dirt a couple of times, but the little girl couldn't care less.

"Daddy! Daddy!" she shouted, running into the arms of a familiar man. "Look what I found! Look! It's Soy-saw-ya!" She pointed at them.

Flor was just about to smile at the sight of Allen and Ellie, father and daughter, when she abruptly stopped, feeling the edge of a rifle in her back. She looked at Sawyer who growled and put his hands up.

"Maddy! No, be nice!" Ellie shouted. Allen put Ellie down.

"Princess," he said, "listen to me. Go into the cave now."

"No –"

"Ellie! You walked away without permission. Now go!"

Ellie looked scared but did as her father said; putting away a large branch over a small entrance which she crept into what Flor assumed was the cave.

She held her hands up, wanting so dearly to look behind her to see who was pointing the weapon at her.

"Maddy," Allen said. "Have you met Sawyer and Florence Bluth?"

"I do not believe that matters," a young woman's voice replied. Flor felt the rifle leave her back and saw Maddy walked over to Allen's side, still pointing the rifle at them.

"Allen..." Flor began.

"What the hell are you doin'?" Sawyer finished for her.

"Protecting my daughter," he replied shortly.

Sawyer looked around. "From what?"

"From you," Maddy responded.

"From the last of my knowledge both you and Flor were with the Others," Allen said. "And I know we have history but the Others have shown that they are very capable of turning friends against friends. I'm sorry, Sawyer, that Maddy has to point that weapon at you. But here's the truth - I cannot trust you not to go to the Others and tell them where we are hiding."

"We have just escaped the Others!" Flor shouted. "We have just rescued Sean, Eva –"

"And where are they?" Maddy asked. She looked a bit shocked, trying to hide it, but Flor had seen her surprise when she heard the name Eva.

"Can we trust you lot not to tell the Others where she is then?" Sawyer asked. He nodded at Maddy. "Who's the little brunette ninja here then? Another castaway, good Al?"

Allen didn't seem to know how to answer that."You I can trust, maybe, Sawyer. Because you... well. I believe you would never betray Rosalie, would you? But you, Flor." He turned to her. "Last time I checked you sold all of us out, Sawyer included. Want to explain that?"

"I'll explain everything if you promise not to kill us," Flor said in one breath.

Allen chuckled at that. "Kill you? I'm not like you, Flor. I would never kill you. More like tying you up here and then leaving to another hiding place."

"Why can't you go to the beach, then?" Sawyer asked.

"Maybe it's for the same reason you aren't with Eva and Sean and whoever else you helped flee," he replied just as fast.

Sawyer raised his eyebrows and said nothing more.

"What do you think?" Allen asked Maddy in a whisper, but Sawyer and Flor could still hear very well what he was saying.

Maddy took a deep breath. "I think I'm tired of holding up this weapon," she said and put it down.

"Just one big happy family," Sawyer muttered and sat down because his legs couldn't bear him anymore.

**. .**

Jim followed Garret (despite all of his protests and: "Monsters, that's what's in there!") into another tunnel. He shuddered, avoiding looking up at the roof, but still hoping the light would come back again. He thought about the light a lot.

"Garrett," he said, "what was the light?"

"Nothing you should be concerned about."

"Well, yes..." The tunnel turned darker. Garrett, luckily, had a flashlight. "But, the thing is," he continued, hurrying to keep up to Garrett and not lose that source of light. "I am, concerned, I mean. What is this place, really? I know it's the forbidden area and I can see why..."

He saw hieroglyphs on the wall, he almost slowed down, but the light didn't and he had to tear his eyes from the curios drawings.

"You named this place?"

"That I did," Garrett answered, not throwing a glance the hieroglyphs' way.

"So you've been here many times before?"

"Two times. It is nothing I recommend. Now I do recommend for you to be silent, Jim."

"O-okay. Right. Silence. I can do that. Easily, watch me –" he turned his head and caught the sight of another hieroglyph, "– is that the sign for –?"

Garrett gave him a death stare. Jim shut his mouth.

For a minute.

"Garrett, are we close to the exit?" Jim asked, keeping his distance because Garrett could punch him, he had been with Liz after all.

"We passed it a minute ago." Garrett said it in his same monotone voice.

"W-what?" Jim stopped. "What do you mean we passed – we have to go back!"

"We have to use another exit."

"Why exactly?" Garrett had stopped walking too, and Jim didn't care if his voice was a little too loud when he continued, "I don't care where we end up just if we can get outta here! Gary –"

Garrett pushed him up against the wall. Jim was so shocked he went silent, just staring. Garrett turned off the flashlight. Jim breathed as quietly as he could, because now he could hear what Garrett had been hearing.

Someone walking, a dripping sound Jim now knew came from blood. The sound of the safety of a gun released, someone breathing, someone also waiting and watching.

Whoever it was got closer, but it was pitch dark and Jim couldn't even see Garrett and he was pressed right up with him.

He wanted to know who it was. He needed to know whoever it was. It was like the light. He knew it couldn't be so good for him, but he needed it with all of his heart – kind of like his friendship with Maddy.

"Ga –" Jim began, because the breathing was gone and that meant the person was gone, right? Garrett immediately put a hand over his mouth to keep him quiet. Jim made a muffled sound. Jim saw a flash of worried blue eyes – Garrett's – and stopped trying to get free. Garrett was _scared._

The flashlight was turned on and a big stream of light lit them up and the person in the dark watching them. Jim barely had a moment to catch a glimpse of the person before Garrett was dragging him with him, away from there.

"Wait –" Jim protested, looking back. A gun went off and by his side dirt and gravel shot up in the air from a bullet.

"Run!" Garrett shouted, and Jim did, because Garret's voice was absolutely terrified. They didn't speak as they blindly side by side ran through the tunnel, barely seeing where they were going. Another shot rang out behind them and Garrett dropped the flashlight.

Jim slowed down.

"No, Jim!" Garrett shouted as Jim grabbed the flashlight from the ground. No sooner he stood up straight he was knocked back down.

He looked up into the eyes of his attacker, shielding his face from another blow. But there was no other blow.

Garret cried out, "No, don't, Liz –"

He felt the gun against his temple.

"No!"

Suddenly the gun was gone. He heard the person (was it Liz?) groan, and Garrett dragging him up again and they were running, this time the way opposite way.

"It was Liz –" Jim panted, but didn't say anything else because he had a hard time breathing, and everything was a blur as they darted the fastest they could – wherever it was Garret was running to.

"In here." Garrett pushed him inside a path he hadn't seen before. They couldn't run – stones were in their way. It looked like it had collapsed, but Garrett pushed him on.

Jim heard another shot ring out. He wasn't hit. And he didn't turn around to see how close they were.

"You first," Garrett said when they couldn't walk anymore but had to crawl through a tight space.

"You sure –?"

"Go!"

Jim went. He crawled the fastest he could. Dirt ran down in his face like a waterfall. He coughed hard, fighting on. Finally his hands were free, and he could almost stand up as he made his way outside to the jungle, the humid wonderful air.

He stumbled over to a tree, and collapsed against it. He wiped sweat and dirt away from the corners of his eyes.

"Gary…" he panted, turning around.

Garrett had not come out of the tunnel yet.

Jim stood by the tree, and he waited as the sun hid behind the clouds, and he waited until he couldn't stand any longer and he sat down again, hugging his legs like he was a little child.

Jim wiped at his eyes again, not sure whether it were sweat or tears he wiped away, and continued to wait.

He waited until he heard a loud growl in the distance. He stood up, looking around. That sound… the sound all of his people had warned him about.

He walked over to the entrance of the cave. "Garrett?" he shouted. "Garrett, please," he begged again.

He waited a few seconds, but there was no reply. He heard the loud clashing sound again, saw trees sway in the distance, and once again, Jim ran for his life.

**. .**

"What do you call this place?" Owen asked when she reached Richard. Her arms were wrapped around her body, the wind blowing in her frayed hair. "It looks old school."

Richard made a smile Owen caught, she savored the knowledge she could amuse him for a moment before she sat down next to him. Too close for him to be comfortable, but it suited Owen just fine.

"We call it the Ruins."

Owen looked at the tiny bricks and the remnants of old stone structures. "Wow, how original."

She teased another smile out of him.

"No, I mean it, the fact that you dare to call these amateur get-paid-and-leave thing the Ruins. Wow. Owen scoffed. "You guys suck, I shall name this the… Olwynanian Temple… that has become ruins! Got a nice ring to it and then people will love to visit such a place. We could make money out of this, you and me."

The smile on Richard's face was gone and he was back to his cold self. "Was there something you wanted, Owen?"

"Lots of things."

"Then I can't help you."

Owen sighed. "What the hell is Ben up to? He was arguing with Locke earlier."

"Locke…" Richard seemed to be looking for the words. "Is in a situation very similar to yours."

They were quiet for a moment until Owen said, "You mean I have a rival?"

Richard nodded.

"And we both have to make sacrifices," Owen concluded.

They both turned silent again.

Owen decided to break it, hastily she said, "Did you know I have already killed someone on this island?"

Richard slowly said, "Ethan is still alive."

"No, I mean I have killed someone before. Earlier. He was at the beach, a survivor. His name was Sayid Jarrah."

Richard tensed, glancing her way.

"I smashed a rock over his head," Owen said dryly. "He had been torturing Claret. He had been a good man, I suppose. People respected him. Then he went and tortured jumpy-Claret. Little-Claret. Always so-freaking-scared-of-shadows Claret. Does that justify it in your own, personal opinion?"

"That… that wasn't a sacrifice."

"Right…"

Richard licked his lips, he then saw someone down there. Owen followed his gaze. It was Locke.

"I have to go." Richard picked up the file next to him and left her there, sitting alone watching over all the people. She saw him go over to Locke, Richard handing him the file, whatever it contained – Locke wasn't really supposed to see it.

Owen could turn her back; she could run the fastest she could into the jungle behind her.

But she didn't. Because down there was Juliet, speaking to Jack by one of the tents, and she was going to have a talk with them.

**. .**

Andrea had yet to lower the gun despite pleas from the survivors. Fox and Kim were the center of attention as the survivors were circled around them.

"Why not? Andy –" Libby begged once again at the sight of the weapon.

"Fox is going to make an announcement," Andrea said again, she was only staring at him, the gun raised in the air.

"I know, and everyone is here now. So you can put the gun down, okay?" Libby said, she raised her hand, but didn't dare to touch Andrea in fear she would do something drastic.

Hurley nodded in agreement, he was holding baby Aaron in his arms. "Yeah, chill a little."

"I will not 'chill'," Andrea spat.

Margo looked at Zidler in worry. "Has she gone mad?" she whispered to him.

"Andrea has every right to point that g-gun at me," Fox said, quite loudly to be him. Kim looked shocked, and so did many of the survivors.

"Fox…" Kim said silently.

Fox nodded at the group that had assembled, wanting her to go over to them.

"No, I will stay here," she said, and Fox didn't fight her on that part.

"So what is this big message then?" Lori asked. "Spit it out."

"Yeah, Andrea's turning a dangerous shade of red over there," Zidler pointed out.

"Tell us, Fox!"

"I…" Fox started, then the words all got stuck in his throat, and he felt the familiar panic rise up, his throat closing, no, no, no, no. He couldn't panic there. Not now. Not this moment!

Fox just stood there in front of all his friends and everyone he had get to know, and he thought of that time they'd gotten Tom and Karl and Fox had been so scared that they were going to tell everyone who he was. But it was just the fear of getting found out, it was the frustration that he could help the survivors so much if only he could, but couldn't because no one could or ever would know he was – had been – with the Others.

Fox knew though that all of that – all that fear of getting found out, was because he knew he was going to be revealed some day. Ben let him alone there for now (and why Fox had no idea) but Fox and the survivors and the place he could actually belong to would never last forever.

How could he tell them?

"He's an Other!" Andrea shouted.

He couldn't.

"Yeah… no," Zidler shook his head. "Fox is not an Other. Andrea, you're confused. Right… Fox?" Zidler turned to look at Fox, who looked away, which was hard because they were all in a circle around him so he looked down at his feet instead.

It was the answer they needed to know it was true, but to believe it? To believe it he needed to tell them everything.

"M-my name is Fox Edwards. I was recruited here, after my brother… it – that doesn't matter. Ben sent me to infiltrate you t-together with Ethan back when the plane first crashed. I… I… helped, Ethan, we had to make lists of people we… And Claire… She was p-pregnant, and we wanted to help her b-because pregnant women don't survive on this i-island, they can't give birth here and Ethan was a doctor and it did help b-because Aaron is now here…"

Fox looked up when he heard a whine and saw Hurley who was slowly backing away, holding Aaron closer to him.

Fox stopped himself, he couldn't excuse it away. Claire was gone now. There was no way they would understand. Fox didn't even understand it himself.

"I'm n-not with them anymore… I'm not one of them anymore, they let me be and I – I don't know why they did but I stopped. I'm not a part of what they do anymore. And the reason I told you t-this, now is… Wendy."

Wendy didn't even look surprised. She almost looked tired as all eyes fell on her.

"Wendy knows where the radio tower is, and i-it's true, we have to stop t-that message. But there's a-another thing. There's another tra-transmitter."

Dom turned away from the crowd and took a few steps away, suddenly getting a headache.

"There's another Dharma s-station c-called the Looking G-glass. I know where it is. We have to shut off that transmitter t-too, it's b-blocking all signals off the island. You had to know, so you can leave this place."

Dom stumbled further away; Kaylee caught him out of the corner of her eye and followed him.

"I j-just… I'm sorry." The words would never be enough. Fox waited, waited for Andrea to lose it, waited for the mob to get him.

By a tree further away Dom fell down to his knees.

"We." Margo took a step forward, the first one to break the silence after what Fox had revealed.

"What?" Andrea and Fox both said.

Margo's eyes were almost shining. "So _we _can leave this place. You too, Fox."

"Are you kidding me? He's an Other!" Neil shouted.

Margo ignored him and went to stand on Fox's other side. "Not anymore he's not."

"He's lied to all of us," Kate said, then realizing what words had come out of her mouth, looked like she immediately regretted it.

"Yes, but… it's Fox," Sun said thoughtfully.

"Let me get this straight," Janna said coldly, "he is one of Benjamin Linus's people. The people who took and imprisoned me?"

"Yes…" Sun said quietly.

Milou, Fred and Miles were already on it and surrounded Janna, Milou speaking rapidly why Janna shouldn't use her weapon and exactly why she shouldn't blow the guy's head off because it wasn't really their place to pass judgment upon him.

"Fox," Lori walked up to where she thought he was, which was surprisingly accurate, "I, after this, will take you to the jungle where I will kick your ass until you wish you never been born, and then we're going to go back to the camp so we can get bloody rescued. And boy, do you got things you gotta explain or what? But first thing's first. Andrea, if you're still holding that gun up put it down."

Andrea already had, she wasn't joining the people close to Fox, but she wasn't going to shoot him. "We have to punish him in some way."

"Why?" Libby asked her softly.

"How can you ask that when Claire is gone, Jack, Brian, Boone, the kids, Libby! Remember the kids?"

"Fox didn't do that."

"But if he had told us sooner…" Andrea shook her head.

"He would have been torn to pieces by the wolves."

"Why do you have to be so sodding nice, Libby?" she asked, feeling tears well up in her eyes of frustration.

Libby shrugged, looking after Hurley and Aaron joining in on the "we forgive you" group.

"No, you d-don't understand…" Fox tried to say, but people weren't listening to him, he didn't deserve their forgiveness, he didn't. He couldn't accept it. "It was I – I who burned down Claire's shelter."

Suddenly everyone got silent.

Then Lori punched Fox right in the face.

"I'm going to kill him!" she shouted. Desmond grabbed her arms and dragged her away, Lori hit wildly around, of course not seeing what her target was. The survivors just stared, all in shock.

Andrea made her way through them, holding the gun tight, Fox looked into her eyes.

"Is there anymore vital information you have to tell us?"

"A l-lot."

"Anything to get us of this island right at this moment?"

"What I – I have already told you…"

"Then draw me a map and then you leave and you never come back," Andrea said.

Kaylee put a shivering hand on Dom's shoulder, and waited, the survivors were in uproar, and Dom was still, too still.

She waited.

**. .**

"Ben."

"Juliet."

Juliet walked into Ben's tent, closing it behind her.

"You gave Florence Bluth a gun," Ben said, monotone, like it wasn't as big of a deal as it really was.

"I did."

"Why?"

Juliet stared right back into his eyes, not wavering the slightest. "You told me Florence Bluth had to be protected at all costs. You confided that in me."

"Not at the account of my life."

"I knew she wouldn't shoot you. She's not a murderer."

They stared. Ben blinked.

"Maybe you hope now she had been," he said quietly.

"Was there anything else?" Juliet asked.

"Vincent isn't bothering you with that tape of you Madeline and Claire?" Ben asked her.

"I think he's forgotten it."

"Good. Allen's escape was unfortunate, but Shephard trusts you now, doesn't he?"

Juliet nodded. "He does. He's talking to me about escape now. He wants it to happen soon, while we're on the move and weakened."

"Ah, we're not weakened," Ben corrected her, "shaken, yes, but not weak. Make him wait. We need a few more days, then we can put the plan into work."

Juliet nodded. "Is that all?"

"No," Ben shook his head, "that's not all. Can you... prepare the prisoner, Littleton, Claire? If Owen sees her in the state she's in..."

"Right, I'll do that, Ben."

Juliet left the tent without another glance or a word. She barely made a few steps before Owen Chauncey blocked her way.

"Owen," she said.

"Juliet. We gotta talk."

**. .**

"All right," Owen said, a little while later when she, Juliet and Jack were in Juliet's tent. "I'll help you, but Juliet, you need to help me first."

Juliet nodded. "I will, with what?"

"Lalah. What happened to her?"

Juliet glanced Jack's way. "We don't know. Lalah went into the tunnels with Garrett and a few others, and they didn't come back. We found Diane dead down there, traces of blood. We have no idea if she was taken or if she left."

"Flor and Sawyer didn't tell you guys anything?"

Juliet shook her head. "No."

"Did you see Bonnie, then?"

Jack shook his head. "Sawyer… came to my house, talked to me. I had to play my part in front of him. But later when I and Juliet helped them flee from Ben's house when it was rigged with explosives – I think he got that we were on their side."

"And why couldn't you guys just escape then? I don't get that. Flee with Flor and Sawyer."

Juliet and Jack changed another one of their looks.

"We had to stay," Jack said.

"I had to make Ben trust me again," Juliet explained. "We saved his life by dragging him down to his basement. We had to stay."

"But now it's just…" Owen pulled a face. "Free to go?"

"Yes!" Juliet almost shouted. "We have to go soon. Jack's in danger."

"Okay." Owen nodded.

"You help us escape, and we'll help you kill Sven," Juliet said, taking a step closer to her.

Owen nodded. "Remember, I want it to be slow."

"It will be," Juliet assured her.

Jack made a disapproving face in the corner. Both Juliet and Owen ignored him.

Owen began to leave, but Juliet touched her arm.

"Claire's waiting for you. You know what you're supposed to say, right?"

"You know me, always good at remembering my lines." She winked and left.

"Are you sure of this?" Jack asked Juliet.

Juliet was still looking after Owen. "No, Jack. I'm not sure of anything that has to do with Owen Chauncey."

**. . **

Ellie sat in Allen's lap as Sawyer and Flor told their story. They left some things out, but not the blood and the gritty too-true parts. Judging by Ellie's lack of reaction at words like explosives and guns she had really become used to the island way of handling things.

Sawyer leaned back. "We know it was a stupid plan –"

"Understatement," Maddy said.

"But it worked, didn't it?" Sawyer ended. Flor threw him a look, his forehead was dripping with sweat, despite the fact that they were just sitting still there in the clearing.

"Can we get some more water?" Flor asked.

Allen handed her a bottle, looking at Sawyer, noticing his distress too.

Flor handed Sawyer the bottle.

"So, what 'bout you?" Sawyer asked, after taking a sip, sounding like every word he said took on his powers. "How'd ya team up with miss traitor here?"

"Maddy is not like your average Other," Allen said. "In the way that she and Juliet conspired to help me and Claire away from there, and therefore help Ellie and Aaron."

"How so?" asked Flor, remembering Juliet had also helped them in the end, and even tried to help her once when she had first got taken by the Others.

"They wanted our children. Why they just didn't go and grab them –"

Ellie whined. Allen immediately held her closer.

Maddy continued for him, "We attempted to escape, but I was shot and Claire she... she did not... we left, Allen and I. And Allen went back to the camp to get Ellie because we could not be sure the Others would leave her alone."

"So you've been living out here?" Flor looked around at the trees. "Here?"

"We have been surviving," Maddy said.

"And for how long did you plan to do that?" Flor asked.

"How long did you?" Maddy shot back.

They both stared at each other.

"You don't like me," Flor said and Sawyer rolled his eyes.

Maddy frowned when Flor then smiled.

"You don't seem to hate me like the rest of your people do."

"They're not my people," Maddy said at the exact time Ellie and Allen said: "They're not her people."

"Why's that?"

"I do not have any reason to that is why." Maddy looked up at the sky. "It will be dark soon. You are welcome to sleep here for the night."

"The night?" said Sawyer.

Maddy nodded. "Yes, of course you cannot stay any longer."

"What?" Flor and Ellie said.

"Sawyer can stay if he wants to, but you can't, Flor. That is just how it is."

Allen nodded in agreement.

Maddy went on, "They want you dead. They will have you dead. And if we are in danger because we have escaped – we are even in more peril with you here. I am sorry, but that is the way it has to be. You will leave this place and we will find a new hideout."

"Why?" Ellie whined. "No, Daddy, say she can stay… say she can..."

"Ellie," Flor took a deep breath, "it's okay. I'll leave now."

"Wait a second here –" Sawyer started.

Flor shook her head. "She's right. The Other's right," she said a little bitterly. "I have to go. And don't think about following me." She didn't look at him, but Sawyer knew she was speaking to him now. "This is your chance to survive."

She took the water bottle from him. "I assume I can borrow this?"

Maddy nodded, all the sharpness in her eyes was gone and she almost looked sad at the fact that she was leaving.

"You're going now?" Sawyer barked.

"Yes. I'll cover my tracks the best I can."

"Here," Maddy gave her another water bottle and a backpack Allen had taken from the beach camp. "There's a knife in there. Could be useful."

"Do you have any gun clips?" Flor asked.

"Not that we can spare" Maddy answered before Allen could.

"I'll..." Flor looked down."I'll..." _See you?_ "Goodbye," she said, and walked away, despite Ellie's attempts to go and hug her, despite Sawyer's angry shouts.

She had just reached the end of the steeply path when she felt a hand on her shoulder. It was Allen and he was holding a gun clip in his hand and rope, and another water bottle in the other.

Flor took the things. "Thanks."

"I will never forgive you," Allen said.

"I understand."

"Something is happening," Allen said, "I have talked with Ellie, and she has seen things... a helicopter..."

"I know about the people from the freighter," Flor said.

"Do you know there is someone out here now?"

"Sawyer said that at the beach..." She bit her lip, thinking of the name, Frederic Phelps. The need to go to the beach just to see him... to make sure... but she couldn't.

"No," Allen shook his head. "Not at the beach, out here, in the jungle. We were going to move anyway. Someone has been stealing our food, a weapon. No animal, but person. We have no idea who it is but whoever it is, is not an Other. And does not want to be seen. Be careful, Flor."

"I – I will," Flor said, stunned by the new information. Allen disappeared down the path, and Flor took off into the jungle, this time, alone.

**. .**

"My dear Claire." Owen smiled brightly. She had been to her tent and changed before she had gone to meet Claire. Owen looked much cleaner, wearing purple shoes with just a hint of a heel, a skirt and her bright smile only shone up with the lip-gloss on her lips.

Claire herself also looked like she didn't fit in at all on the island, with her hair was now neatly combed and her new clothes, but her smile was nonexistent and her glare furious.

"Sit down," Owen said, gearing at a chair. She looked at two of the Others watching Claire. "Could you get each of us a drink? Thanks."

They walked away and Claire carefully sat down in one of the sun chairs. Owen happily leaned back in her own, putting on her sunglasses.

Owen chatted for a while, about everything and nothing and Claire was silent in the chair next to hers, wearing a confused face. Owen just happily talked on.

The two Others came back with their drinks and put them on a small table. She waved them away.

Owen looked over the friend on her side and smiled gratefully. Claire met her gaze.

"Did you ever think we would get here?" she asked sweetly.

Claire frowned deeper and she crossed her arms and bit her lip like a little child.

"Oh, don't be that way." Owen rolled her eyes. "C'mon, take a drink." She waved with her own glass in hand but Claire didn't uncross her arms. "Fine, be boring," Owen muttered.

They sat in silence, and the sun disappeared behind some clouds.

"Have you considered the suggestion?" she asked, knowing Juliet had talked to Claire before.

Claire looked away. "I have already said no."

Owen grimaced at the word she would say next. "Please," she got out, using all her best acting talents she had. "You don't know what will happen if you say no –"

"They will be safe," Claire shot back.

"Are you serious?" Owen chuckled to herself. That was real. "Safe? Girl, we are never safe. So now let me hear, what's your real answer?"

Claire looked exasperated, sitting higher up, looking at Owen with pleading eyes. "I just don't understand –"

The look Owen gave her was so sharp Claire turned silent. Owen said slowly so she would understand, "You do what we want and _I_ won't blow his brains out."

"Why me?" Claire cried out desperately, and she sat up straight now, almost knocking over her own drink when she raised her hands. The makeup and the clothes might make Claire look like she was fine, but Owen knew the scars and horrors she had seen. Claire was breaking. Now, finally she was going to fall apart.

Owen felt sick at what she was going to say next. Claire was that, easily broken, Owen enjoyed having broken down people like her before.

But it was Claire. Claire who had begged Owen to help her. Claire who had looked down at her newborn child with such love, who had let Owen hold the baby which no one else would have let her do.

"Because," Owen put down her glass, trying to keep her voice steady and her face stern, "you are the only one who can get away with it." She looked away, not wanting Claire to see she was wavering. "Now, what's your answer, will you do it?"

Silence.

"Yes," Claire whispered.

Owen smirked, blinking hard. "Good."

Owen left Claire in the chair, the drinks, and went to find Ben. She took off her shoes and threw them over the grass, not caring who saw. She stumbled into Ben's tent.

"She agreed to do it, you can stop holding that gun to his head now," she muttered, glancing Brian's way.

Ben lowered the gun. "And you didn't even have to take here here. Good work, Owen."

"Whatever." She could hear Brian trying to speak through his gag. "I'll do it tonight, Ben. I'll kill Sven. See you."

She left the stunned Ben; she left Brian, and went to find Juliet again.

This better had to be worth it.

**. .**

"So Claire agreed?" Juliet asked her. They were once again in her tent. Jack was sitting on a chair in the corner, watching their conversation with a bemused expression on his face.

Owen nodded, walking back and forth inside the tent, she wasn't worried. She was just finding it a hard time to be still. "She did. She didn't want to see Brian dead I suppose. Look, Ben suggested you'd be the one to hold her hand all the way back to the beach."

"I know," Juliet said.

"Then what about Jack?" Owen said a little too loudly, waving with her hand, almost like Jack wasn't there to defend himself.

"Don't worry, Jack will still get to escape, and we still need your help. Just do your distraction." Juliet also talked about Jack like he wasn't there – he sure looked like he didn't want to be. "And everything will proceed as planned."

"There is no freaking plan!" Owen shouted again. "Juliet… you're making this up as you go, aren't you?"

Juliet sighed. "No, I'm not."

"Liar," Owen muttered, she stopped walking and turned around. "See you tonight at the killing ritual thing whatever."

"Wait, you almost forgot the fake poison!" Juliet shouted.

"Ah, the times when I didn't hear people say so and think it was normal." Owen turned around again, a small smile playing on her lips. She hadn't known Juliet would have gotten it done so soon. "How do I know it's fake?" she asked at the sight of the small little vial Juliet picked up from her satchel.

"You don't," Juliet answered.

"It's venom, Owen," Jack said from his little corner of darkness and brooding. "It's venom that will render him paralyzed. Even I will have a hard time hearing his heartbeat."

Owen raised her eyebrows. "Really?" she asked, turning back to Juliet.

Juliet nodded. "If what I picked up from Jim's ramblings is true…" Her breath hitched, reminding Owen that other people were gone than just Lalah now. "It's venom from a spider. Jim called it something… I think he called it the Medusa. It's because it with one little bite renders the person paralyzed for several hours, depending on how many bites, and how much venom. They will be perfectly awake for anything that happens to them while they act like the dead."

"That sounds amazingly horrible," Owen whispered to herself. She turned the vial upside-down. The fluid was transparent, with a hint of yellow. "Of course this could also just be some dirty water."

"It could," Juliet replied.

Owen glowered at her. "Could you stop making me try to doubt you?"

"Nothing I say will change your mind."

"True." Owen put the fake /real venom in her pocket, threw one last glance at Jack and then walked out of the tent. It was soon time to let Sven suffer the worst fate she could think of.

The Others burned their dead.

**. . . .**

"The press is going ballistic with this, Owen. You running off like a madman, rumors about a secret lover, it's all flying wildly around and people are believing it like it was the air they breathe."

"You mean I'm," Owen grimaced, "like, getting a slap on the wrist or what?"

"I mean," Tina said and made a frustrated sigh, "that I'm helping this situation far more than you understand, but that you're doing nothing hiding here in your hotel room."

"It's a nice room," Owen muttered, a hand trailing over the coffee table.

"You keep changing rooms," Tina pointed out.

"It's all to be safe."

"From a threat that isn't there."

Owen gave her a murderous look.

"It's true," Tina said without any regret. "You know it is. Sven is not after you anymore, hell, last I heard he was somewhere in the Canary Islands. It's you and it's your head."

"Everyone knows how messed up that is," Owen mumbled.

"It's that what's creating this mess for you, you need to get your problems sorted out starting with – and let me finish his sentence young woman…" Tina paused for effect "…therapy."

"I'm not _ever,_ going to talk to a shrink, _never._"

"Not even for your career?" Tina snapped back.

"Never," Owen repeated.

"All right, then you'll have to do an interview, with the press. Where you are sane, charming and soothing. Can you do that?"

"Yes."

Tina looked like she doubted that greatly. "I'll leave you alone to practice, but you'll do this tonight no matter what. Okay? I'll come back in an hour to get you to makeup."

"No matter what," Owen mumbled looking down at her hands.

"And no more changing rooms!" Tina shouted before she shut the door.

Owen sat there on the couch for a moment, another moment, a minute, minute turning into ten, all while staring down at her hands, like she had been frozen there in time in the expensive hotel rooms with only one light coming from the bedside lamp lightning up the room in ominous shadows and monsters.

Owen saw none of those shadows or monsters. She had her own shadows and monsters in the lines in her palms. The same hands that had let go of the steering wheel, the same hands that had reached out for the person in the other seat –

She inhaled sharply, as the cell phone, lying there on the coffee table began to ring.

Tina.

She picked it up, taking a few seconds before she answered, breathless, "H-hi."

"_Owen_."

Owen had expected it, why else had she just been sitting there, waiting.

"Clearly not female," she said, "hello, Sven."

"_Are you not going to run away now?_"

"I don't think I am. Where's Tina?"

"_She is looking for her cell phone, currently_."

"Ah," Owen stood up, quietly making her way over to the lamp on her bed stand, "you've started to steal. I get that was just slightly away from when you started breaking into my house and, I don't know, push me down the stairs amongst other things.

"_I had to do that. It didn't bring me pleasure, I don't like stealing or… breaking in._"

"Or push someone down the stairs and leave her to die."

"_It was never my intention of killing you_."

Owen opened the drawer slowly, carefully. "So making my car crash, that – that was just an unfortunate accident?"

"_I wasn't driving that car_."

"No, but it was you who still made me crash. You wanted me to die." She bit her lip as she took away a little paper covering a small, black gun.

"_I didn't. But it's clear you will not believe me_."

She picked the gun up, holding it hard. "Why did you call me, Sven?"

"_I wanted to let you know I'm sorry for your loss._"

Owen stopped, froze with the phone in one hand and the gun in the other. "Don't you dare, don't you – ever, ever pretend like you're sorry. For what you did to –"

"_But I am, Owen. I am truly sorry. But it's not my fault._"

Owen ran with light steps over the living room, to the hall. "It was you who killed –"

"_No, I never did anything. If you had just listened to me that day, that day after your first accident in the hospital, if you hadn't run away I wouldn't have been forced to follow you and make sure you did as I said_."

Owen hid behind the door, looking out through the small cracks, waiting for anyone who could come in. She was ready.

Sven continued, "But now it's over, I won't follow you anymore, Owen. I will disappear out of your life. I will let you go."

"I don't want to let you go. I want to say goodbye. You're in the hotel. Why don't you come to my room?"

"That's not possible."

"No, no, no, of course it is. You can come here, have a drink, before I stab you in the stomach and watch you suffer until your last dying breath. Doesn't that sound like fun? Doesn't that seem like a punishment not even close to the one I'm enduring?"

"Owen –"

"You killed my _daughter _you son of a bitch! And you can run now and flee to whatever the hell you're wasting away all that money I earned for you. But while you do that, remember that one day I'm going to slowly torture you to death, and you're going to regret, you're going to regret it, wishing that car hadn't crashed into us and killed her. I'm going to make you regret it –"

The line was dead.

**. . . .**

"A knife would be more ceremonial," Ben said. The night had fallen. Owen had not been asleep, but pretended to do so when Ben had awakened her.

"It's time," he had said.

They left her tent. Sven was now tied tightly around some sort of column.

"In your back perhaps," Owen replied innocently.

"Is that a threat?" Ben asked as they walked towards the column, past all the Others watching them, awaiting, patient bust still excited despite their stillness.

"Don't be so paranoid," Owen muttered. "Poison will work just fine, going to sleep, he deserves that at least."

"Whatever you say."

Owen walked up to the column, feeling all eyes on her. That was a good thing – not just the attention – but so all eyes were turned away as Jack, Juliet and Claire left into the night. Jack believing he was escaping. Juliet believing Owen was helping them. Claire thinking they weren't escaping at all, and she was right. They were just going from one trap to another, and Juliet knew that, just as well as Owen did.

Owen held the syringe containing the vial… the Medusa venom Juliet had given here and walked up the steps, Ben with her.

She stared into Sven's eyes. He could at least not talk.

Then Ben took away the gag and Sven was muttering, Owen could hear the threats, she could see the crazy in his eyes, back where… back where the real world was. If this wasn't real. There Sven had always been collected, almost regretful about what he had done. Owen could remember looking into his eyes when he had come up behind her in the dark, before he had hit her stomach and shoved her down the stairs. He had said he was sorry.

He wasn't sorry now. This was his true self. The one fighting against the binds, the one spitting and shouting, anyone could see he was crazy here. Here he was real.

"Owen?" Ben asked.

Owen had been staring at Sven for a long time, Sven stopped fighting.

"She won't do it," he said, "she won't kill me." He laughed. "She's too weak. Always so weak. Aren't you? Aren't you, Olwyn?"

"Do it," Ben snapped, Owen glanced at him, and her gaze got stuck on everyone watching her. She found herself looking after someone… and saw him. Richard was standing there in the crowd, arms crossed. He didn't want to be there. She could see that. She wondered how much he would hate her if he knew what she was planning to do.

Suddenly she wished for a knife. She moved closer to him.

"This won't bring her back, Olwyn," Sven spat. "This won't bring the little bastard child of yours –"

Owen slowly, almost gently, pushed the needle into his neck. Drool ran down the corner of Sven's mouth, his eyes moved rapidly but then slowed down, he became limp, and then his fingers stopped twitching and he became limp. She'd done it. She looked into his eyes, and knew he could still see her, but she didn't even smile.

She turned back to the crowd watching her, and she bowed. There was no applause, only whispering. She still bowed again like she was getting standing ovations, before stepping down to the ground.

She saw a figure disappear behind a tent, and frowned. A shiver ran down her spine and she stopped walking. Staring after whoever it was she began to walk again, back to her tent, away from them all and from that ghost haunting her memories.

Sven was not dead yet. She would not attend to his funeral. She had doomed him. It would be the Others who killed him. It was easier to think that way. It was easier to think like that also when it came to another person she'd killed before. _Self-defense. I was only protecting Claret._ _I didn't know I would crush his skull with my stone. I didn't know I was that strong._

**. .**

The dark had fallen. Flor made her way, now without having to think if Sawyer was keeping up, trying to find the next thing to make him survive just another day. There was a hollowness that came with it. What did she have to fight for now?

She set up a goal: find a safe place to spend the night. Maybe she could tie herself up in a tree with the rope so she would be safe from predators while sleeping. Yeah, because she was so good at tying the knot.

She walked back the way they had come, thinking of the large rock, anything familiar, but the dark was falling fast and she was tired and couldn't help the hole in her chest at the thought of Allen, Allen who had his daughter now, but was trapped out here on the bloody damn island.

She heard the leaves rustle, it was probably wind, but with Allen's comment of someone out there… someone other than them… made her bring out the gun. She could just as well fill it with bullets right at the moment.

She put down the bag and leaned against the tree.

She froze. She'd heard the sound… the sound of another gun. From somewhere behind her, she tried to keep her breathing steady, whoever it was hadn't fired yet.

Flor held onto her own gun hard, trying to listen the hardest she could. The bag was a few feet away from her. If she threw herself forward and snatched it and then ran for her life left… then… she was screwed. And dead.

She had to shoot first.

Flor moved fast. She fired into the trees behind her. Didn't look back and then ran for the bag. She heard someone cry out. Had she hit them? She was just about to fire again when someone leaped and threw themselves over her.

She dropped the gun and they both tumbled down on the ground, Flor underneath.

The person – the woman – tried to get a grip around her throat. But Flor had been in this situation too many times. She kicked the hardest she could in the woman's stomach and she fell back, allowed Flor to crawl away from her.

The woman charged at her again – growling. Flor avoided her blow and threw a punch straight in her jaw. She stood up and tried to get to the gun but the woman grabbed her feet and made her crash down into the ground.

Flor moaned in pain, the whole world in a whirl in front of her. Something sticky ran down her face – blood. She saw the woman struggle up to her feet, reaching for the gun. She saw her face.

"La… Lalita?" she panted, recognizing her. "Lalita! Rosalie's wife – you're… No! Don't shoot. I'm Flor. Florence Bluth a s-survivor. I was at the beach. The Others took me!"

"Lies," the woman said, picking up the gun. Her face was streaked with dirt and there was an animalistic look in her eyes. "You will now die, as one of them, one of those, those who took my family away from me…"

"Please, trust me!" Flor cried out, wincing again, she was trying to sit up but her head hurt too much. "I – I rescued her, your daughter. I rescued Eva!"

"Lies!" Lalita screamed and pointed the gun at her. "You killed her!"

"No! I just saved her! She… she escaped with Bonnie. Bonnie McQueen… Sawyer and I helped. Please don't…" Flor was sobbing now, looking into the barrel of the gun. "Please – please don't shoot."

Lalita still held the gun in the air, but she tilted her head slightly to the side. "Sawyer?"

Flor nodded rapidly. "Yes, yes, Sawyer…"

"Where is Sawyer?" she asked coolly.

"He was hurt. Really bad. So he stayed with… Allen, Allen Harwood, his little kid Ellie…"

"And the Other Madeline." The look in Lalita's eyes was mad now. "He's with them too. I've seen them, Allen Harwood is a traitor, I took things from them, couldn't kill 'em. Sawyer has gone over to the Others."

"No! No he hasn't. Oh, Lalita, he hasn't, Maddy is d-different."

"You're also one of them."

"No!" Flor screamed as Lalita prepared herself to shoot her. "I can take you to your daughter! She isn't dead. Let me take you to her."

"She isn't dead?" Lalita looked doubtful, but Flor knew, she knew the desperation for that last little glimmer of hope. The maybe.

Flor shook her head. "No, she's not. I can reunite the two of you."

Lalita looked unsure again. "I can't trust you."

"You can keep the gun then," Flor said breathlessly.

Lalita stared into her eyes for a long moment. She then let her arm fall to her side. "We have a deal."

**. .**

**Author's Notes:** I am a horrible person, for many reasons, for this delay, for laughing when people fall… but this chapter is dedicated to Girafe13 whose birthday I totally missed and thus the chapter title is a reference to the awesomeness that is her. Nice break from the usual, isn't it? Well, it will continue on for a while.

Everyone should have a flying unicorn.

Namaste.


	52. No Rage

_"Heaven has _no rage_ like love to hatred turned  
Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned."_

- William Congreve

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 43, No Rage**

**. .**

"Long time no see."

Sean parted his eyes slightly, but it hurt, awakening hurt. The light from the sun blinded him; the shadow of the man kneeling in front of him turned everything to blotches of darkness in his wronged vision. He felt like he was paralyzed from head to toe, but he could feel the pain in his legs, like they had been stretched out until they broke, and the ache in his back coming from laying on top of roots and stones.

"Is he ever g-going to get better?" a scared, worried woman's voice asked.

"Yes, but it will take months," a man's voice answered, an eerily familiar voice. But he couldn't place it.

"We don't have time for that!" the woman's voice yelled a little too loudly.

"Which is why you contacted me. Here."

He saw the bronze arm lift something white, and white was passed on to a pale shivering hand.

"You mean…" Hesitation, realization, "he must get started on drugs again?"

This was not a man of many words; Sean knew that, if only he could – if only he could open his eyes more. If only he could concentrate on whom the voice belonged to.

"You need to start giving him those. Yes, he will become addicted."

Silence.

"Thank you," the woman said in a shivering voice.

"He is still working for us. He still has work to do. Claret, I did not do this for you. This is for my employer."

"I understand."

"He needs to be taken back."

"What?"

This man didn't like to repeat what he had said.

"Then you need to return to us too. Linus is making a plan to attack the beach. You will have to be sure of which side you are on then."

If he concentrated really hard, he could see clearer. He parted his dry lips, tried to speak, just raspy breaths, they didn't even notice.

"Bye, José."

There was no answer. He felt Claret's hand touch his.

"Sean?" she whispered gently. He could hear the man's steps fade away. "Sean, you need to open your mouth."

He was trying. He really really was.

She made a frustrated noise and separated his lips herself. He could feel her drop water in his throat, followed by a pill. "You need to swallow, Sean, please, you need to swallow."

He swallowed. His throat burned. He felt like he was choking.

"And again, open your mouth again."

More water. More pills.

The world was just a little bit clearer and his head was on fire.

**. .**

"Why?" Kim yelled.

Andrea stood up so fast she hit her head in the low tree branch. She winced at the pain, eyes squinting at the sun, the sun made Kim look like she was almost glowing from where she was standing.

"You need to elaborate on that _or_ you could get back to resting," Andrea said. As the pain faded away she creased her forehead in worry, but tried not to show it. Kim saw the struggle – and she wanted to hit her, throw sand in her face, because how did she dare to be worried about her?

Kim could barely speak, there were many words she could call Andrea in her own language, but they weren't even near enough. "Why did you throw one of your people out in the jungle? In the jungle where people get shot, where they get hurt…"

"And whose fault is that?" Andrea shouted, the crease gone as her eyes narrowed, and it wasn't because of the burning sun. "I don't have time or energy for this argument, Kimika –"

"Kimika?" Kim muttered. "_Andrea_, Fox is –"

Andrea shook her head and began to walk away, Kim followed her best she could, the pain was still there but not as much, she could ignore it. "He told us the truth! To get us all rescued. Even though he knew, I saw it, Andrea, in his eyes that he knew you were going to do this or even worse. And he told you all anyway –"

Andrea turned around, Kim stopped, they were standing very close, and Kim suddenly felt very small, even though Andrea was shorter.

Andrea glowered at her. "What in your small little pathetic mind makes you believe that I actually care? Do you think that Fox's little guilt tripped speech is going to change what he did? Can you even get it into your head what he did? Claire's shelter, almost killing a mother, hurting Kaylee. _Kidnapping._ All the things he could have told us but didn't. I do not care about Fox anymore. I do not care if you don't want to rest anymore. You're a grown woman, your choice to live or die. What I do care about right now is to get the hell off this island."

Andrea walked away, not bothering to even throw a last glance Kim's way.

**. . . .**

"Gosh, shut your whining," Esmeralda (real name unknown to Kim, but that wasn't unusual in this line of work) said. "Your glitter's all messed up. Why do you have to sweat so much?"

Kim frowned. She knew many words for a person like Esmeralda in Japanese, but Esmeralda would never understand them here, here in New York, instead she said, "I'm sorry that my natural cooling down process is a…" Inconvenience? "…problem to you."

"Honey, I don't think you understand half the words you're saying." Esmeralda blew her blonde fringe back to take a look at her work – her work that was Kim. "Gold, purple, not too many glitter-sweat chunks. Adequate enough to go."

Kim didn't answer her, waiting for the call. _Adequate enough_.

"And now gentlemen, our very own Asian beauty and star of the show… The stage is yours Amethyst!"

Lights flashed in blue and red. Silent sirens. The music pumped up as she came out on the stage, she wasn't the only one there. She grabbed her pole (Not so harsh, she remembered Esmeralda telling her). Nervousness, any hesitation she might have felt was gone and all she did was to do her thing. She slid seductively out of the red, oriental dress and stepped out. Cheering met her but she was blind to it. Just red and blue. Red and blue.

She remembered what her mother used to say about strippers. She stepped out of the skirt slowly. Someone shouted in appreciation. The thing she'd said weren't exactly nice. She would have a heart attack if she saw her now.

After that thought it became easier. She flashed more smiles, seductively dancing, removing pieces of clothing.

Yeah, easier.

**. . . .**

"Sawyer?" Allen turned around when he couldn't hear the steps behind him. Sawyer was sitting on the path behind him, an arm over his knee.

"Just resting," Sawyer mumbled, but he grimaced.

They had left their shelter by the cave, Maddy had not been pleased about that, sour and bitter she'd snapped at everyone around her, but Allen could understand her. It was not just that Maddy was too old and too young at the same time, childish and wise, but it was that they could have stayed there for much longer. Allen had proofed the cave and they had gathered things and it had begun to feel like a place they could stay for, at least for a while. Then the appearance of Sawyer and Flor ruined it all.

Allen thought of Flor with a twinge of hatred, but years of being a columnist had taught him to try to see it from her point of view too.

He looked at Maddy. She let go of Ellie's hand and took off her bag, it thumped down on the ground hard. She crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows pointedly.

Allen sighed and walked over to her, knowing exactly what she was thinking. Ellie played with some stones on the ground. "We can't leave him." He had agreed on the Flor part, but Sawyer, despite everything, had been something like a friend to him.

"I have not suggested we should," she whispered back. "I suggest he should go back to the beach – to his people."

"It's not safe there!" Allen said a little more loudly than he thought. His back was to Sawyer so he couldn't see what his reaction was, but Ellie suddenly stopped playing.

"It is not safe for us with him here," Maddy said, and Allen knew she was right. They couldn't go back, but Sawyer still could, just that Allen didn't have the time to show him the way back – and the question was_ if_ Sawyer could make it back at all. He said he was better, and his fever was lower, but he still had a fever.

(Allen also had flashes in his mind of people he'd known_, Libby, Hurley_, but he pushed those away.)

Maddy sighed and shouted to Sawyer still on the ground and trying to pretend like he was fine, "You can rest even longer. We're making camp for the night."

It was still the middle of the day.

**. .**

"Hi, Kim…" Kim dropped the two Kim fruits in the sand, and hurried to pick them up, but then she dropped the basket containing mangos and a bottle of water too. And in her distress to pick them up she knocked her head on the new diner table.

She stood up and met Libby's look with a smile, even though there were now two Libby's and her head was hurting. "Hi."

"What are you doing out of bed, sweetie?"

"We do not have beds," Kim said, and rearranged the now sandy fruits.

"You know what I mean," Libby said gently.

Kim swallowed and put the mangoes back in the basket. "I'm fine, Libby. Thank you for your… worry. But I am fine. It doesn't even hurt anymore," she lied.

"Kim, if you need to talk I'm here. Fox –"

"Libby!" Kim shouted, picking the basket up. "I really am fine. Please."

She walked around her, glancing back to see Libby watching her as she walked away, but then Libby's gaze averted to Hurley who came up beside her. They kissed and Libby smiled when she looked at him and there was nothing to compare the joy of the grin on Hurley's face.

Kim saw Kaylee walking by with a bucket full of water, but luckily she didn't stop to say anything to her, she saw Fred trying to speak with Wendy, but Wendy kept looking away from him over to where Zidler and Margo were making some sort of list, she saw Janna and Milou arguing quietly.

She snuck into the jungle, and when in there, hidden away from the survivors she sunk down on her knees, looking down at her shirt. She lifted it up, and saw that one of the wounds was bleeding again. She took a deep breath before standing up again, and continued on her way.

Kim didn't slow down until she was far away enough from the camp to walk out on the beach safely. There were footprints in the sand, all leading up and away from a formation of rocks, safe from the water, safe from the jungle.

"Hey!" she shouted.

She climbed up between two of the rocks, there was a small little refuge between the rocks. But there was no one there. She stared at the emptiness (small little stones, washed up seaweed, but for her it was the most empty place in the world), just stared until she jolted back, almost fell down the rock trying to get away from there.

He had been there. She had followed them. She had seen them led him away there. _He was supposed to be there._

Kim didn't see herself as a very negative person – but the pain of her wounds was nothing compared to the pain in the place where her heart was a twisted knot.

She walked around the rock, and the waves went all the way over her knees, and they had washed away all traces of foot prints. But the pain was replaced by determination, and she walked along the waves and up the beach and closer to the trees until she saw one footprint, just one, and it was enough.

"Fox, you baka," she whispered to herself and went back into the jungle once again.

Without knowing she was being followed.

**. .**

"W-what the devil?" Dom shouted, eyes flying open and he startled, scrambling to sit up. He blinked and wiped away the water trickling into his eyes. He made quite a sight – water dripping from his hair, plastered against his forehead, clothes drenched.

Kaylee stood over him with an empty bucket that had just a moment ago contained said water.

"Not the devil. Worse," Kaylee said. "Now you listen to me, Dominic Austen or I'll get a club to hit you on the head with instead."

"You just threw water on me," Dom said between his teeth, still not quite believing it.

"It was the only way to wake you up," Kaylee snapped back, but there was a hint of worry in her eyes. "Now you tell me, Dominic Austen, what the hell have you been dreaming about?"

"You know you're overusing my whole name, right? And you sound like Kate when you do that."

"_Dominic Austen –" _threatened Kaylee.

"All right, all right," Dom said quickly. "Shut up and let me get some breakfast first."

"Club. Hitting. Your. Head."

Dom sighed, giving up. "Fine, all bloody – fine. I'll tell you. Can't I just… some fruit, at least?"

Kaylee crossed her arms.

Dom rolled his eyes, and in a monotone voice, told her everything.

**. .**

A hand turned the book around to look at its cover, whatever it was was uninteresting, and it was thrown away. The hand belonged to Desmond Hume, who was shuffling through a bag in the shadows of an abandoned shelter.

He put away two pens, a worn-out green shirt and something that looked like a mix between the Kim fruit and human eyeballs, before he found something that fascinated him. He stared at the cover of the ledger and opened it. It was written in a language he didn't understand, looked like Latin. He flipped through it and saw that a few pages had been ripped out. He turned a few pages back, and realized that the language had changed, it wasn't Latin anymore. It sure looked like it. But somebody who had read books on code in the Hatch for years it was easy to see that this was something utterly different.

"Des?"

He turned his head and saw Pe – no, Andrea, not Penny, stand there with a frown on her face.

"I was just looking through Fox's… his things; see if I could find something useful."

"And did you?" Andrea asked.

Desmond hid the ledger under his blue shirt before he stood up and shook his head. "Nay, nothing of importance."

Her arms fell to her side. "I'll get Lori. Meet me by the trees in a minute, okay?"

"We need Fox back." Andrea sighed later when they had gathered, head resting against the tree. She looked resigned, her words almost sounding small in Lori and Desmond's ears. She swallowed before going on. "I know I was the one to throw him out of here, a moment of fury, and I still wouldn't object to see his head on a plate, but we need him."

Lori scowled. "I will beat up that little –"

"What my little sis is trying to say," Desmond interrupted quickly, "is that Fox isn't in anyone's good graces. But, aye, we do understand."

"Well, you two might have forgotten," Lori said, "but as Andrea just said, we threw him out. He's gone. Poof! We have no idea where he is."

"Kim does," Andrea whispered.

Desmond stared at her, Lori gaped for a moment similar to a fish, before stuttering out, "W-what?"

Andrea chuckled, but her eyes were sad. "You know her. You really think I didn't see her follow us when we led him to those cliffs? And then all those trips to 'get water' and 'collect fruit'."

"Ah," Desmond said at the revelation, and then, "Why do you not just get him?"

"Because I can't," Andrea said sternly.

"Why?" Desmond asked.

"Because we would lead him right back to the wolves," Lori said, "like me. Which reminds me, why can't I beat him up? Just a little? Remember when Sayid tortured Claret?"

Desmond and Andrea stared at her.

"Oh, right. You guys weren't here. See Sayid –"

"Not important." Andrea turned to Desmond. "Either I talk you Kim, or you do. In the moment Kim believes me to be as bad as she should see Fox, so I suggest you do it."

"Do I have much of a choice?"

"Don't you want to get rescued?"

Desmond sighed too, in a very resigned way like Andrea.

**. .**

"Where are we going?" Claire asked them. Her face was dirty and her hands were clammy and she felt with every step they took like she was going to collapse, but if there was anything she had learned, was that she was a lot stronger than she thought.

"Owen told us something," Jack explained. They hadn't exchanged many words on their journey through the night, away from the Others, away from being trapped, even though for Claire she still felt trapped, knowing Brian was behind there and the threat of _blowing his brains out._

Mostly her and Jack's attempts at conversation was interrupted by Juliet if they tried, but now Juliet was silent, letting Jack tell Claire. "We have to pick something up before we go back."

"And what is it that we have to pick up?" Claire wondered, a frown appearing on her face.

Juliet and Jack shared a look.

"You know what?" Juliet said. "You guys need to get to the camp. I'll get the thing and — you'll go and..." She shared another look with him. "You know what to do."

Jack nodded, and he took Claire's arm to lead her away from Juliet who disappeared into the jungle, without them.

**. .**

Flor had just gone away for a moment into the trees. Only a moment away from Lalita and the guilt that ate her up inside, making her feel like she wanted to find the nearest cliff and throw herself off it.

It had been just a moment.

When she came back she saw Lalita fallen on the ground.

She didn't think. She just ran.

"Lalita!" she shouted, kneeling beside her. She was passed out. "Lalita?"

She heard the safety of a gun being released. She froze for a second. She then turned her head slowly and faced a man with tanned skin and mischievous eyes. "Who…?"

"Jim. Jim Al. You might recognize me. I sure recognize a pretty face like yours, Florence Bluth." The man grinned, white teeth, striking eyes.

Flor stood up but Jim raised his gun and she stood back, hands slightly raised, but not in defeat.

"You going to shoot me?"

"I'm thinking about it."

"You should. That's your duty, isn't it? That's what you all want. Me, dead. I suppose you, the Others, would be very happy if you came back with my head on a stick. Maybe they would forgive you for whatever you did."

"Why would I need forgiveness?"

"You're running just like I am," Flor said quickly, hoping she was right. "Why else would you be here? And you haven't pulled the trigger yet. Not that it would do much good."

"Is that so?" Jim said.

He fired the gun.

Flor blinked, smiled and pointed the knife she's taken from Lalah on the ground to his throat. "It's empty of bullets, genius."

"I knew that." Jim dropped the gun, and now he was the one raising his hands. "It was just a show. Mind lowering that knife? You could accidentally stick my eyes out."

"I don't want you to hurt that woman anymore," Flor said, nodding at Lalita lying on the ground, looking like she could almost be asleep with her eyes closed and her hair falling over her face. "And I want you to give me your own knife. I might need it."

"To kill more?" Jim asked, thinking of Diane bleeding out on the ground, thinking of those whispers about a new leader – a leader whose life was shortened brutally by the woman in front of him.

"To protect myself from the likes of you," Flor snapped. "Give me the knife, okay? I'll let you go."

"You will let me go?" Jim asked, almost laughing at the ridiculousness, but he still picked up his knife from his boot, slowly, carefully under the watch of the other blade.

Then he snatched Flor's knife right out of her hand before she had the chance to blink.

"Now I have two knives and you got zero. So I would think you need to be a little bit nicer to me," said Jim. Flor was still blinking, looking surprised at her own empty hand, like she couldn't believe the simple trick he'd done.

"Just let us go," Flor begged quietly.

Jim shook his head, pitying her, "I can't do that."

"Okay," Flor swallowed, "why?"

"Um… I thought it was kind of obvious."

They stared at each other. Jim frowned slightly, looking at her up and down like he had never really seen her before, as he recognized her as something else than a mindless killer.

"Do you know someone called Frederic… Fred, Fred Phelps?" Flor asked him in a tiny voice, a voice that was completely gone of all the harshness from what she'd said earlier, this sounded true.

Jim shook his head, though he had heard of the name he didn't think it belonged to the person she was asking for.

"That's good," Flor just said and waited for the inevitable blow.

That never came.

Jim suddenly looked around, lowering his arms and the knives a little. He looked scared as he turned around to look at the treetops. "That can't be good…"

Flor didn't say anything, just waited for her chance, to run, to get the weapons back, but all her plans were turned to dust when she heard a horrible sound, clashing, something ticking.

Jim glanced at her. "Nice to meet you," he said before he jumped over Lalita and dashed off into the opposite thickness of the jungle.

Flor bent down beside Lalita, shaking her hard. "Wake up, wake up, wake up," she begged while throwing worried glances into the trees. Lalita's eyes opened slightly, just as a tree in the distance was thrown up from its roots.

Lalita opened her eyes completely, dark and furious and Flor didn't think before she struggled away from the woman, knowing she couldn't stay. She heard the sound of another tree falling and ran the same way Jim had, away from the monster hunting them.

**. .**

Fox hadn't gone very far. Of course he hadn't gone very far with the monsters that lurked behind every tree and the memories that were more terrifying than the prospect of meeting Ben again.

He had carefully avoided another trap – one of that French woman he kept hearing about, he supposed – and was having trouble deciding between staying, leaving, staying, leaving, for there was a little part, and did he hate that part, that wished that somehow they would find him again. The survivors (his friends?) that they would forgive him, impossible, but weren't dreams always impossible?

He sat down on a stone, moist from morning rain and his stomach growled with hunger. He remembered Room 23, and the dullness in his brain after being there, like all his emotions, all his thought and hopes had been wrung out of him like a wet cloth. He had always been sacred of feeling like that again, but this was worse, this feeling everything.

He heard something snap, rustle, and he turned around, to his feet, his feet that were too uncoordinated and he almost tripped and fell but he collected himself in the last second. When he saw who it was, he almost fell down just because of that. _She followed him, she'd forgiven him, no she was here to kill him. _All of that was possible.

"Y-you…" Fox stuttered, swallowing down the rest of the words, Kim stared at him. It felt, in just a moment, like he was back at the camp and that he was supposed to now tell her to lie down, rest, you're hurt, yes, I'll stay by your side.

"I used to be a stripper."

Fox blinked.

He hadn't known what he had been expecting when Kim now stood there, face dirty, basket in hand, but those words had completely taken him off guard.

"I haven't told anyone here though I think Sawyer knows. He called me Amethyst. Now you tell me everything. Or I'm going to leave and you're never going to see me again."

"I-I…" Fox didn't know where to start. What did she want to know? She kept staring at him, and he felt like she was scanning him, piercing into his mind and what she saw she didn't like at all. Fox could understand, he didn't like himself that much either.

"I d-didn't mean to do it," he blurted out. "Claire – she w-was my friend. From the beginning. Even during…" He swallowed. "Ethan had visited me, I thought I had been… not safe, but… I was shocked. I hadn't… I c-c-couldn't… I was out of everything. I couldn't concentrate. Everything hurt. He threatened to snap someone's neck. He said I had to mess up or he was g-going to_. And I wasn't going to._ I wasn't. Next thing I know the small light I put up in Claire's shelter… it's… It was a mistake.

"Everything about coming here was a mistake. I just didn't know w-what else I was supposed to do. I was so t-terrified all the time. Terrified of Ben. Terrified of the island. Terrified of you. But then… I came to feel, like, like I belonged with you, somehow. And I kept thinking it was t-too late you tell you, too late for everything, and that I didn't need to… but I did. I didn't sign up for taking away Claire, but you don't know what they can do, what Ben can do. I was terrified, like a-always."

He blinked again.

"I understand," Kim said, she looked like she was wavering. "People are always gonna judge you."

Fox felt like he had jumped off a cliff only to find a mattress at the bottom. "Are you comparing being a stripper to being an Other?"

"No," Kim said. "I haven't killed and kidnapped."

Fox's hand shook. He didn't deny anything.

"But what I know – what I have learned from everything I have been through. Is that there is always another point of view."

"I wouldn't know," Fox said.

"You stutter a lot less all of the sudden."

They stared at each other.

"I – I know," Fox stuttered.

**. . . .**

"_How's the college life going for you Kimmy?_"

"It's…" Kim tried to find the right word, but there wasn't really any, "…okay," she said into the phone.

"_Uh-oh, that bad?_"

"No. It's… it's really okay Angela." She stepped over a pile of books on the grimy vinyl floor.

"_Hmm. Your tone says different. Is it the money? I thought you got a job right?_"

Kim looked into the mirror with cracks on the sides. The glitter had clumped around her eyes. She had yet to take a shower. She shuddered at the thought of the cold water.

"Yeah, yeah money's no problem," she lied. "So are you and Jared still all over each other?" Kim said, trying to change the subject.

"_We broke up_."

"You did what?" Kim yelled. If there was any high school sweethearts she would have bet would make it, it was Jared and Angela. They had been so obvious she hadn't even thought any different when she had first come to America, assuming that was how it was, instead of assuming the right thing which was that they were so far in denial land.

In the end they had finally fled denial land and realized what everyone had accepted as a fact years ago.

"_Just joking, chill Kimmy. By the way, baby, it's cold outside! Let us in!_"

"Let you in… You're in Los Angeles aren't you?"

Kim's rising suspicion was only confirmed when the doorbell rang. She stumbled over the pile of papers and pulled the rickety door open.

"Kimmy!" Angela cried out and pulled her into a perfume-filled hug.

Kim should've known. Angela loved clichés. She turned off the phone and happily hugged her friend back. Over her shoulder she saw Jared stand in the doorway, looking like he didn't know what to do as always.

There was a lot of yelling and jumping around after that. And Kim didn't even get angry when Angela lit a cigarette in her one room apartment, just opened the window and threw it out and returned with a smile.

"Don't you think that's going to cause a fire?" Jared said after awhile.

After they put the small fire that had started on the ground, Kim's happiness faded, she was overjoyed to have her friends with her. One of the hard things of New York was being away from everyone she knew. But it was the question she feared that made her smile disappear.

"So where do you work?" Angela had asked, after realizing she and her boyfriend had to stay in a motel or something because Kim's apartment was just that small.

Kim gulped.

**. . . .**

"There's two of you," Sean said to Claret, wincing and squinting.

"Close your eyes," she said gently, he didn't, so she came and pressed two fingers down and his eyes were now closed. "You need to rest. Here, take this."

"You're feeding me drugs," Sean mumbled. His eyes flew open, he swung out with his arm but he didn't hit Claret, just tried to push her away. "_No_."

"You don't understand, Sean," Claret pleaded. "You need this. To get your body working, so we can go back and warn everyone. You want to see them again, don't you? Sean. Please. Oh, Sean. Why are you not getting better?"

"B-better…"

"José said you would get better."

A memory. Files. Money changing hands from wrong people to the right people. It flickered and it died. "No," he protested. "No, no, no, no, no."

**. .**

They were still there in that little clearing in the jungle, Kim and Fox, together.

Kim was speaking fast, hurried, like she was afraid she would never say the words if she didn't say them now. "I – I'm not going to forget that you lied. Andy might think so – she – she hates me for thinking that. She doesn't know that I… I just don't think we should put punishment on you. We have all done things, but, Fox, it doesn't change that you did lie, and who knows what else you have done. When I look at you know," she did, and she swallowed, "it does not feel the same."

The basket was forgotten, they were half-laying, half on the ground and half on the stone and they weren't touching, but it almost felt like they were, like the space between them was filled with something big and important that couldn't falter but at the next moment it felt like something would crumble if they moved apart or any closer at all.

"Why d-does it feel like we're missing something great?" Fox asked after the silence.

"Maybe because it didn't even start."

Fox turned his head to look at her – she was gazing up a the branches. "I c-can't go back."

"Who says that?" Kim said fiercely, knowing very well who said that. She sat up and whatever that had been between them that moment broke. "Who – what are we going to do? Just leave you here? Go and – and – we can't do that. They can't do that. We can't."

"When a-are you leaving?" Fox asked.

Kim shook her head. "I – I do not know. Andy's… she's not telling. We don't know. Fox, I think they need you."

"No, no you – they, I m-mean, they don't."

Silence, again, awkward and too much for the both of them to bear.

"You'll stay there… right, at those rocks?" Kim asked without looking at him.

"Y-yes."

"I'll come back tomorrow, if we… if we…" Kim didn't finish the sentence, she didn't have to, Fox understood.

**. . . .**

Her heels clicked against the pavement of the road. She'd escaped the evil, stubborn clutches of what was Angela and Jared's endless catching up with the excuse of an extra shift down at the store she was working on. ("In the middle of the night?" Angela had asked, crinkling her nose. "It's New York," Kim had said with a shrug.)

Kim knew what was going to happen if she told Angela the truth of what she did to pay for a living. She would judge her, lips thinning and eyes darkening and that I-am-so-much-better-than-you look would kick in and Jared, Jared of course would be insufferable. And then they would suggest she talked with her siblings – or forced money upon her and Kim couldn't have that. She refused to have it like that.

And then they would ask if it was about _him_. Like Kim had taken the job as a stripper from grieving over _him_.

She was so lost in her thoughts that she accidentally knocked into a man. He'd been standing just in the shadows next to the light of a lamppost before she'd pushed him hard.

"I'm so sorry!" Kim shouted, startled. She bent down to the ground to pick up the pack of cigarettes he'd dropped on the ground. "Here, so so sorry." She smiled apologetically. "I didn't mean to, I wasn't looking –"

"That much's clear, love," the man said, but she could now see him in the light and he was smiling a little. His eyes were gray, even in the yellow light. "Although…" He picked out a cigarette that was drenched from the puddle, holding it in his glove-clad hand.

"I would offer to buy you a new one, but I'm really late, I'm so sorry," she repeated, putting her hand on his arm.

He looked quite amused by the situation, soaked cigarette in hand almost being pushed to the ground aside. "You from around here?"

"As much as you." She recognized his accent, but she couldn't place it. It sounded like a British one, but with something else too…

"Figured as much, folk around here don't say sorry so much. They're often more likely to take my cigarettes and run off."

Kim laughed politely, but she really was late. "Sorry again," she said. "I have to now… uh, goodbye."

"Goodbye, Kimika," the man said.

Kim frowned, but smiled a little still. She wrapped the coat tighter around her and asked, "Who are you?" Did she know him? He didn't look very familiar to her, blonde hair and accent all unknown.

"Name's Simon."

Despite being late, she was curious. "Simon who?"

"Simon… Just Simon Bailey," he said with a smile on his face too.

"Well, Just Simon Bailey, I have to get to work," she said, turning around to walk down the street once again.

"Ah, yes, your job." There was something in the tone of his voice that made her stop and look back again.

"I'll be there in the crowd, watching." Simon waved, shortly, before he left in the opposite direction, disappearing into the shadows.

Kim was left gaping after him, before she remembered she was late, and she half-jogged with difficulty on her heels away from the lamppost and the strange encounter.

**. . . .**

"There is no removing sand tracks," Desmond said breathlessly to Andrea and Lori, sounding like he had been running.

"You found him?" Lori asked.

Desmond nodded.

"Show me where so I can punch the living daylights –"

"Lori," Andrea interrupted her, it was hard to do so, because she would really like to see Lori beat Fox, but Andrea prioritized getting them off the island first, even if it meant admitting she had been… well, not wrong, but foolish to just cast him out immediately.

She sighed and turned to Desmond. "There will be no punching, but you have to show us where. We can't waste any time preparing or anything. We need to talk to him now."

Desmond nodded, and the two of them and Lori (muttering behind them all the things she'd liked to do to the "stuttering bastard") set off.

**. .**

She sat down by the river, drinking from the water, before wiping at her mouth. She put her knees to her chest, hugging herself. Jim was sitting on the opposite side of the river on a rock, watching her. Flor kept her distance and Jim kept his.

He supposed they were both a little shaken up after seeing trees getting pulled out from their roots by something (Jim knew what he had seen he could just barely believe it.)

"So, why is a pretty girl like you here out all alone?" Jim asked to break the silence.

Flor stared at him, her gray-blue eyes dead serious. "You just confessed to wanting me dead and now you're hitting on me?"

Jim shrugged but didn't look sheepish at all. "T-tu as des… yeux magnifiques! It's French," he explained at her confused look. "It means you have beautiful eyes or something."

"You know who I am, right?" Flor asked him.

Jim grimaced. "Yes, unfortunately, instead of seeing this appealing gorgeous woman in a very thin and ripped dress in front of me all I keep thinking is 'murderer! Murderer! Run for your life!'"

Flor rolled her eyes. "Not kill the murderer before she kills you?"

"Nah," Jim shook his head, "I know the power of mothers," he said, thinking of his own. "And I have this need to satisfy my curiosity – amongst other needs of course – did you and hot-stuff-if-he-wasn't-such-an-ass get Eva outta there?"

"Why should I tell you?" Flor asked suspiciously.

"I take that as a yes then. Did you kill many doing it? I think it's fair if you answer that question."

Flor snorted. "Fair? You're talking to me about fair?"

"Yes I am. Considering one of your people tried to kill me, you know. Kimika Yamazaki. Cute girl. I would've tipped her for a lap dance if she hadn't put a bullet in me. And then there's the whole fact that I didn't go after you after you hurt one of my closest friends, Lalah. Know her?"

"We killed no one," Flor said, not meeting his eye, not making any comment to the information revealed. "We are not like you. We just wanted to save her. Save Eva. And we did." She made a sad smile. "Ha, we did."

"Save her?"

"Yes," Flor now met his eyes, "we did."

"You know what rumors were flying around here when I first came to this place? It were rumors of our new leader. Not Owen Chauncey, not John Locke, of someone else. The way some people spoke of it – like they were talking of a new Messiah. Wanna play guess the character?"

Flor leaned back, looking a little bitter, but her eyes were soft. "Rosalie," she said the name like it hurt. "Are you going to try to kill me or something?" she asked him.

"That would take time and way too much effort," Jim said.

"Where will you go?"

"Back, I suppose, to the people you call Others. Unless you've seen a pretty brunette girl around with a habit for never using contractions called Maddy."

Flor hesitated. "I'm all alone," she breathed out. "You should go back, if you can, I can't. So there is no point for you to storm the camp after me. I'll be out here, hiding."

"And it's not like I could cross that river anyway," Jim said a bit too quickly.

"No," Flor said, even though it was obvious he could.

They were just about to part ways when Jim spoke again. "You sure you haven't seen her, Maddy? Your eyes, recognition, y'know."

"I haven't," Flor said again, but her voice shivered.

"Look," Jim said, "I just fled from the people I've been living with for years, all for this girl. I helped Wendy Reyes escape with Karl. I even let this crazy chick Janna out risking my own neck for it. I didn't go and warn my people when you and Sawyer began your search and rescue mission. I knew that gun was without bullets when I pointed it at you. I don't care about them, right, Ben's people. I care about her. All I want is to find her and help her. Can you believe that?"

Flor looked sad, she shook her head but when she saw his eyes something changed. "I have," she said, sounding like she regretted it but she couldn't take it back, "I have seen her, but I have no idea where she is now. This jungle is like a maze. She's not alone… You should know that."

"I only knocked Lalita out because she tried to kill me," Jim explained. "Self-defense. I like to stay alive. Too pretty to die young and all that."

"I really don't know where they are and I won't tell you, but I can tell you she's alive," Flor said, and she was preparing herself to leave again but Jim spoke once again like always.

"James Ford," Jim said, "he all right?"

Flor looked surprised, her lips shivering like she wanted to speak or cry.

"We struck a deal. I helped him out with this assassin chick called Lalah – is you see her, run, just saying – and he would let me go so I could look for Maddy. Did he… do you know…"

"You're the fanboy." Flor smiled to herself.

"The what?"

"He just, he called you that when we mentioned…" One of those rare times they actually talked about what had happened. She took a deep breath. "Last time, they were by this mountain, cave, but they have left. It was north. I am already regretting telling you this. I just lied, it was actually south. And it wasn't a cave. It was a waterfall. And I didn't see them. Ignore… everything…" She sighed. "Too late, isn't it?"

"Thanks!" he shouted after her, and she stopped in her tracks again. "Thanks… for telling me that. You're not too bad, for a girl everyone wants dead. Hanging out with the chick whose wife you murdered. You got guts."

"Thanks, for being obnoxious and once again telling me you want to kill me."

Jim winked. "Fine line between love and hate, sweetheart. I'm excellent at crossing it."

And they left in two opposite directions.

Jim knowing exactly where to go.

Flor having no idea at all.

**. .**

"Kim."

Kim stared, Andrea stared right back, Desmond stared, and Lori was not looking at any of them but if she could she would have been staring too.

"What are you doing here?" Both Andrea and Kim asked each other at the same time, trees surrounding the both of them, beach just in sight.

Kim cleared her throat. "Talking a walk." And the look she gave Andrea – daring her to say anything about it, to object.

"Oh really?" Andrea raised her eyebrows, crossed her arms.

"Really," Kim answered.

"Come on!" Lori shouted, startling them all. "Kim, we know you've been visiting Fox. Andrea, we all know of your feelings for Ki –"

"What?" Kim shouted before Lori could finish. Andrea looked flustered. "No, I don't know where he is. No. Not at all. I have no idea what you are talking about. Goodbye."

Desmond grabbed her arm before she could get away. "Kim," he said seriously. "We're not here to persecute the fella; we're here because we need him. And I'm here to make sure Lori and Andrea don't go and do anything too drastic."

"You need him?" Kim looked at Andrea.

Andrea looked down at the ground.

"I knew it!" Kim shouted triumphantly. "This is what you get –"

"You can start gloating when we've all gotten off this rock," Lori interrupted her. "Des thinks he's at some formation of rocks, true or not true?"

"True," Kim said, "uh, if you're really sure you need his help…"

"We are," Lori said, and muttering, to herself and just loudly enough that her brother would hear, "and so I can kick his ass."

As they all walked away, led by Desmond and Kim, Janna who had been following her made her way back to the camp, filled with the information she had heard.

**. . . .**

Kim's boss didn't even yell at her, didn't have the time, just a reminder they could get someone just by snapping their fingers in her place instead. "_So you better drag your ass down here in time."_

It didn't go better that one of the guys watching was taking it all a little too far for a strip club, and that she felt like her bones were turning to mush, like she wouldn't be able to make it another step. And that guy just kept continuing, kept yelling racist slurs and touching too much and she wanted to scream.

"Back off, mate."

He came out of the shadows, out of nowhere, gray eyes, black gloves.

Kim stopped, there on the stage, she just stared while the music continued booming through her ears and people around her kept moving, but she was only staring.

"What is that word for someone who follows you around without you knowing them?" she asked him later, when she had finished working and was wearing the coat tight around her again.

"I think it might be stalker, but here's the thing, dear Kimika; I do know you," Simon said walking beside her through the streets, under the lights, it would soon be morning.

"How?" Kim asked.

"That," Simon said, lightning a cigarette, "is a very long and unbelievably amazing story and ends up with you deciding to trust a complete stranger because you're just that nice and gullible of a person."

"Simon Bailey," Kim said very seriously, "the only reason I'm letting you walk beside me now is because in my purse there is a gun."

"That's more like it," Simon said, as they walked together into the fast food place that was open all night.

**. . . .**

Desmond stopped, looking over to the jungle, the waves rolled in over the sand, close to his feet but he didn't notice. His eyes were narrow as his search gazed for something – he looked away, began to walk again, when he heard a shout.

It was of course Lori trying to attack Fox, missed and instead hit Andrea, all while Kim took Fox to a safe distance and explained.

Desmond looked again at the trees, this was the feeling he had gotten when they had first come down into his hatch, that first feeling, not the panic, not the exhilaration that somebody else could take over his work. It was the sense of foreboding.

He walked over to them and interrupted Andrea's speech consisting of many "we are not forgiving you", "we are just using you", "do not have any ideas" and turned her to look at the jungle.

"How far out did we put the traps?"

"Not this far," Andrea said.

"And there is nothing protecting us from the beach way or the water?"

"Of course not," she said. "That wouldn't be possible. Des, what's going on?"

Desmond pointed at the trees where Claire and Jack stepped out from.

**. .**

"Kay?"

Kaylee closed her eyes, before opening them and turning around to look at Kate.

"Hi, Kate," she said, swinging off the bag containing the water, she began to put the water bottles up on the new shelves Bernard had constructed.

"You all –"

Kaylee gave Kate a look that clearly said she would punch her if she asked if she was all right. Kate closed her mouth, and for a moment, she just helped Kaylee with her work.

Until, of course, Katherine Austen had to talk. "Have you seen Dom around?"

Kaylee knocked over the shelf and everything in it fell down. She swore, but didn't bother picking anything up, already seeing Rose rushing to their aid.

"No," Kaylee replied shortly. She put the last water bottle in Kate's arms. "I haven't."

Tears burned hot in her eyes but didn't fall, and tied to block out Rose's worried questions about her to Kate as she walked away.

She saw Milou approaching her and tried to steer away, but Kaylee knew Milou had military training, and cornering someone was not difficult for her.

"Have you seen Andrea?" she asked.

"No."

"We have to speak," Milou said, clearly annoyed.

"About rescue?" Kaylee scoffed. "Like that's going to happen."

Milou narrowed her eyes. "Not if Andrea isn't with us," she said.

**. .**

This was not how it was supposed to go, thought Lori, hand shivering from not being touched and other hand shivering from holding back a punch.

"We have a lot to discuss," Jack said and Andrea agreed. Lori could hear by her voice she had noticed the change in Jack too.

Jack and Claire hadn't exactly run into their arms, crying with relief of coming back to the beach, they had been standing there, staring at them, not as if they wanted to savor the moment, but as if they were calculating them.

Lori had not seen it: but she had felt it. She had felt Jack avoiding her, Claire keeping her distance.

Lori followed them back to the camp, but not with them.

The sun was low in the sky.

**. .**

"Sawyer."

"Sow-ya."

"Sa…"

"Sooooo…"

"You are hopeless," Sawyer said and gave up on ever teaching Ellie to say his name properly. He leaned back against the tree.

Ellie made big eyes, sitting cross-legged in front of him on the ground. "Daddy says hope is most important of all, after hiding and weapon…y, he says so."

"You know what, Goldilocks?" Sawyer leaned in and Ellie leaned in too, like they were sharing some big secret, the little fire they'd made (despite Allen and Maddy saying they couldn't) lit up half of her face. "There is a good chance your daddy is one electron short of an outer shell."

Ellie frowned. "You are ill," she said and uncrossed her legs, fidgeting like a child sitting still for too long, "you got an owie."

"Indeed I do." Sawyer smirked, and Ellie frowned deeper.

"You are… craaazyyy."

"Might be." Sawyer shrugged.

Ellie looked a bit scared, but Sawyer knew the little thing would idolize him till the end of time.

"When's daddy and Maddy coming back?" Ellie asked after a while, Sawyer would have entertained her with stories of his cons, but he was kind of occupied with this thing called breathing.

"Don't know, kid, they might be in a field frolicking with unicorns." He added as an afterthought. "You should get some sleep, don't ya think?"

"No," Ellie said, "Maddy and daddy never force me to sleep early."

"They don't, huh?" Sawyer humored her.

Ellie shook her head wildly. "Nope," she lied.

"Guess they don't want you to be tall then."

Ellie's eyes widened comically. "W-what?"

"They didn't tell you?" Sawyer feigned shock. "It's when you sleep you grow. Otherwise you stay that hobbit-size. Remember Charlie? Yeah, he never slept when he was a kid, never listened to his folks. That's how he ended up the way he is."

Ellie looked horrified. "Is it true?"

"No, I'm lying," Sawyer said sarcastically. "Scram or sleep."

Ellie chose the latter. She curled herself up beside Sawyer (which was an unforeseen possibility) and sighed, closing her eyes. Sawyer didn't know what to do. He had a little bundle of annoying lying beneath his right arm and he couldn't move without making this bundle of annoying probably even more annoying.

"Sawya," Ellie mumbled. _Close enough_. "Is Andy, Kimmie an' everyone else good too?"

"Yeah, kid. They are. Sleep or the monster will get ya."

Ellie whined, and then one minute later she was fast asleep, probably going to dream nightmares.

Sawyer himself had given up on getting any sleep with the throbbing in his leg. He could walk, but there was still the possibility that if he didn't rest enough his leg would get infected and that meant – well, Sawyer was hell of an optimist – death.

Ellie shifted beside him, but didn't do anything that would've helped him, _like falling asleep somewhere else._

Sawyer had begun to drift off himself, eyelids heavy, the fire dying, when he heard rustle behind him. His eyes flew open; he tried to look over his shoulder.

"James."

He looked up, and Locke hushed him, a finger to his lips and a meaning glance at Ellie's sleeping form.

"I need you to come with me," Locke whispered. "I have kidnapped Ben – and I want you to kill him."

**. .**

Sawyer believed them to be together, Maddy and Allen, but Allen was nowhere to be seen as the girl – the young woman – stumbled through the trees. She was clutching at her right arm with her left hand, she was making chocked-off noises, like she wanted to sob but couldn't. Somebody was following her, making sure she got to her destination.

Maddy had grown up with both Liz and Garrett, and they both had taught her many things, and despite barely leaving the Barracks she knew much of the island and with every step she feared the destination. She knew what Garrett, even Liz in short words, had warned her of.

And that was of ever going to the forbidden area.

She turned her head, like she wanted to tell her follower this, but the follower showed her the weapon and she continued on.

Their steps slowed, until the follower's steps were gone, and her breaths were loud in the sounds from the darkening jungle.

She heard steps – not hers, not the follower's – and she stopped. She fumbled with the flashlight.

Leaves rustled. She turned on the light.

He gasped. "Maddy."

Maddy knew this was the destination; it didn't make her feel any relief. She knew what she had to do. She knew what her follower's words had meant when telling her "to persuade him to go away."

"Jim," she said softly, lowering her flashlight a little so he wouldn't be blinded.

Jim was crowded up in her space in less than a second after, hugging her hard, ignoring the flashlight between them and Maddy's hitch of breath. From surprise and from fear, but her follower stayed hidden in the shadows.

"Oh thank all that is holy and all that is not." Jim laughed. "You're alive!" He made another short laugh. Then he pulled away from the hug, holding her away at an arm's length. "Because you are alive, right?" He looked seriously at her with eyes that were too light in contrast to the dirt on his skin. "And you are you? Maddy, or not-Maddy, what did I dress up as for the first Halloween here on the island?"

Maddy did not ask how she could not be her, because she now knew very well what he meant, too well. "You dressed up as a sandwich."

Jim's face split into that grin again. "And everyone thought I was really _tasty_."

She hadn't even smiled, but Jim hadn't noticed, too occupied with the thrill that she was who she said she was.

"You cannot believe what I have endured to find you. An epic tale, it is, of assassins and poster-wall worthy wistfully looking-out-at-the-sea men. And no offense to your dad-_raiser_ and all, but Gary can really be a pain in the rear."

"G-Garrett? You were with him?"

Jim looked taken aback. "Uh, I mean, uh, err, so, Maddy. Uh, great coincidence, us meeting her in these woods… um, after you escaped, got shot from what I've heard even. Big stroke of luck. Uh. So, where's your great mansion? I can settle with a cottage but no less for the night."

"You need to return," Maddy said.

"Okay, so you haven't built a cottage? I can live in a shack."

"Jim… you have to go back."

"Or I can sleep under a leaf. Always wanted to try that, looking up at the stars, we used to do that a lot? Remember that time I got Karl drunk just when he was about to climb that roof? Good times."

"I came here to find you and tell you that you have to return," Maddy said quickly, the words sounding false and inadequate in her own head.

"Right…" Jim raised his eyebrows. "I risked my neck and you got shunned by everyone and now when we star-crossed friends have finally reunited to finally be able to play around here you want me to go back?"

"You have to," Maddy said.

"Maddy," he laughed nervously, "I can't go back. There is no going back for me, for either of us_. I shot at Lalah_. I helped them – the survivors – just like you wanted me to and then I left, and got chased around by crazy Liz in a labyrinth and then I got chased by something you once described to me as a basilisk of sorts I don't even know, Maddy. But what I do know is that I cannot go back. So can you just get over this little freak-out and we can find some shelter and maybe swap stories or something?"

"I am sorry for all the inconveniences you have been put through," Maddy said, looking stoic compared to the mess that was Jim at the moment, his smile had slipped away from his face and he was waving his hands around in frustration.

"Inconveniences? Go back? What the hell, Maddy!" he shouted, too loud for the night in the jungle. "I left for you!"

"And now you need to return, for not only me, for everyone. Jim, you are my... closest friend." Her lower lip shivered. "Please."

He crossed his arms. "No, I'm staying with you. I will follow you, stalker-style I will be there. Talking nonsense nonstop."

"I will run. You know who I grew up with, you know I can. I find it amazing you could even find me in the first place."

Jim swallowed. "C'mon, Maddy, I can't go back. They will freaking exterminate me. Dalek style."

Maddy shook her head. "Jim, they will not. You are a good liar. You need to go back, because… because I need you there."

"You need me there? What if I'm needed here?" He shifted uncomfortably, like his next words physically hurt to say. "What if… you need me? You're too gullible, what if the trees try to take advantage of you?"

"Jim… I left to save Claire but Claire is not saved is she?"

Jim was silent, but they both knew the answer.

"You need to be there and make sure that when Ben does something – if they try to hurt them more – you need to be there to prevent that. Please, Jim."

Jim looked like he was wavering. "They'll shoot me on the spot."

"Your father will never let them."

"My father?" Jim chuckled. "Who doesn't even want to see me?"

Maddy looked sad. "He always did," she said quietly.

Jim looked confused. "What?"

"I - I am truly sorry, but you have to return. I know Ben is planning something which I have no ability to prevent but you can. Do you remember that tape, the tape from the seventies? The tape with the warning of Florence Bluth?"

Of course he remembered the tape. "Yes."

She licked her lips nervously. "The man who spoke in that video, he is in danger, and you need to go back and find out how and then warn him."

"Why are you asking me to do it?" he said, voice low, weak, the voice of a man who had given up.

Her voice wasn't shivering anymore. "Because you always do the things I ask for."

Jim smiled sadly. He pointed a finger at her. "You should return that favor y'know, someday."

Maddy nodded, tears in her eyes. "Of course."

"I don't have to go back right now, do I? You know we could still do the gazing at the stars swapping stories thing, right?"

Maddy looked like she was about to say yes, but Jim continued.

"And then I would have more time to tell you about your fath-_Gary_."

"I will run," Maddy said sternly.

Jim stared at her, and now he was making those doe-eyes. "What happened?"

"Leave."

"Will you die out here all alone in the jungle?"

"Leave."

"I ain't letting that happen."

"Leave."

"I'll find you again with my obviously amazing track skills that in no way was helped by a pretty murderer chick."

"Leave."

"Fine, I know when I'm unwanted. Just remember this moment when you're wailing over my grave, all right? Remember that you were the one who sent poor innocent me into the lion's den."

He began to leave, then stopping, turning around.

"See ya," he said too unkindly and walked away.

Maddy stayed in the same spot, flashlight turned to the ground, heart beating hard in her chest. When the noises from Jim stumbling into trees and tripping over roots had faded away completely, she heard her follower, who had listened to the entire conversation, come out of the trees behind her.

"I did what you asked me to do," she said, voice trembling, "he's going back, almost certainly to his own death. Because he listens to me, he does, he trusts me."

A tear slipped away from her eye. "What happens now?"

She turned around, and looked at him, looked at the man who had raised her since she was a child, to the man who she once actually called a father.

Garrett raised the gun and pointed it at her temple.

**. .**

"I want to talk with him."

Desmond put a hand on Zidler's chest and pushed him easily away. "No," he said, "not right now, brother."

"Nothing else matters! I gotta talk with Fox."

"Hey to you too, Zidler," said Jack.

Zidler's eyes widened. He seemed to just only realize who the people with them were. "J-Jack?" He looked over Desmond's shoulder. "Claire?"

Claire made a grimace, an attempt at a smile.

Zidler saw Kim lead Fox away from there, he wanted to go after them, shout at Fox, ask him questions, stupid things like you were my friend and all this time you were a –

But Jack was in front of him, Claire too, and Andrea, Desmond and Lori still looked grave like somebody had died, which many people had of course, but still, he figured this was cause for great celebration.

"Will you wake everyone up?" Andrea asked him.

Claire looked like she was freezing, arms holding herself tightly in a hug. Arms that wanted to hold something, someone, else.

"Yeah, yeah," Zidler said, tearing his gaze away from Claire's haunted face (she had short hair now, he saw, bruises, flickering eyes). "'Course I will."

He ran away, shouting at the top of his lungs. "Oi! Everyone! A HELICOPTER IS HERE!"

Everybody rushed out from their shelters and everyone's attention was turned to the sky. Andrea stared at Zidler.

He just shrugged and took Margo's hand as she ran over to them. "It's a lot more effective than 'oi, Claire and Jack are back.' They've been gone so long people might've forgotten them."

Claire cried out when she saw Hurley with Aaron, she ignored everyone's attempts to reach her until she held her son in her arms again. Zidler saw tears run down her face; Margo was holding his hand, hard. Everyone was watching the son and the mother reuniting.

Soon Hurley was hugging Claire, and Libby too, and they both led her away to some place more secluded. Andrea seemed all right with it.

"I'll explain," Jack said. Andrea nodded, at loss for words.

Lori was standing back, outside everything, Zidler noticed, and he knew why. He could see it, if not feel it, Jack and Claire returning this close to rescue… he didn't feel that happy fuzzy feeling he thought he was going to, no sunshine and rainbows. He just felt like something was very off, an uncomfortable feeling in his stomach.

That might have been the weird fruit Wendy had given him earlier, it might have been Fox betraying them all, but it was probably the way Jack was looking at them all, at Andrea, at him.

As if he didn't know them anymore.

**. .**

"What?" Sawyer asked Locke.

"I'm keeping him in this old Dharma bunk," Locke explained. "He's tied up and – and I couldn't do it, James."

"What the hell –?" Sawyer began but Locke hushed him again, a meaning look at Ellie.

"I saw Allen and a young woman – Maddy, is it? They are coming back soon. You have to leave before they return. She will be safe. We have to go now."

Locke carefully removed Sawyer's arm from Ellie's side, because he seemed incapable of doing so himself.

"We have to hurry," Locke said.

Sawyer stood up, he threw one worried look at Ellie, but then he heard another similar crackle in the opposite direction, which was probably Maddy and Allen, and he followed Locke back into the jungle.

In Locke's bag was a file, the same file Richard had by his side when he spoke to Owen, the same file that Richard had given him, in his bag was also a lighter, knives and other things one could need to survive in the jungle.

Locke only gave Sawyer one of the knives. As soon as he had the knife in a tight grip in his hand, Sawyer put the knife to Locke's throat, slowly, but Sawyer's hand didn't shiver. "Now you tell me the truth," he growled.

"I told you the truth."

"You got that bug-eyed bastard tied up?"

"Yes, I do."

"Then why me?" he asked. "You want him dead, you kill him."

"I tried – I – I can't. I'm not a murderer, but you, the man you killed in Sydney." Locke saw the shocked look in Sawyer's eyes. "They got files on us, all of us."

Sawyer didn't ask what more was in that file, he wasn't sure he wanted to know.

He lowered the knife and they began to walk.

"How'd you find me?" he asked and tripped over another branch on the ground. Locke was walking several feet before him.

"I was looking for you."

"Oh-okay, if you don't wanna te –" Sawyer's voice broke, it felt like he would break too, he stopped, grimacing and screaming quietly in his head. _The pain_.

"Stop," Locke said, Sawyer had already done so. "We won't get there if you strain yourself, sit, wait here and I'll be right back." He hadn't looked at him once when saying that.

Locke left into the jungle, not bothered by Sawyer's protests.

Sawyer groaned and sat down; he groaned more in pain when Locke came back and put the weird plant-mush thing on his leg. If it had been Bonnie doing this, she would have told him not be such a baby, thought Sawyer. Locke was patient.

"It should keep the pain down until we reach the bunk," Locke said, but there was doubt in his eyes.

"I already know I'm a dead man," Sawyer said.

It didn't keep the pain down, but Sawyer felt less dizzy as they began walking again, this time side by side.

"How'd you find me?" Sawyer asked again.

"Because I knew where to look."

"Never gonna end the vague answers, are ya?" Sawyer asked, even making a slight smirk.

Locke answered as patiently as always, "No."

**. . **

Owen twisted and turned in her little makeshift bed. She felt like she was suffocating, drowning in the damp air of the tent. She was sticky with sweat, and she found herself looking at the fading light of the kerosene lamp before she remembered to close her eyes again.

When she did, there wasn't darkness, but Sven's eyes flickering before stilling, paralyzed. They had buried him instead of burning him. They hadn't told her where.

She made a frustrated noise, and gave up her failed attempts to sleep. She sat up, wiping at her eyes but there were no tears to wipe away, and she swung her legs over so her bare toes touched the ground.

That's when she saw another figure standing inside the tent.

"No," Owen said, as if she could deny the person in front of her until it became nonexistent. "No. You can't…" Owen stopped; she would embarrass herself if she said this was a dream, a hallucination.

"Because you killed me?" Sayid Jarrah said. "Is that why I can't… be here?"

"I have seen stranger things happened," Owen said, more to her than him. She swallowed. "I just find it strange that after so much time almost forgetting what'd happened there in the jungle, you suddenly begin haunting me."

"I think you mean avoiding you," Sayid said, and he looked quite real from the dim light, curly hair, serious eyes, she narrowed her eyes and saw faint white scars at his hairline. "They do not wish for you to see me. Thinks you will… or I will…"

"I will scream," Owen whispered, staring at him, into his eyes. Her face turned upwards, hands clutching at nothing.

Sayid chuckled. "I just wanted to say hello."

Owen had a hard time keeping her breathing and words steady. It felt like her throat was closing. "Are you here to…?" She couldn't even say it.

"Get revenge?" Sayid asked. "I am considering it."

He took a sudden step forward, in her hurry to get away, Owen knocked over the lamp.

She didn't have to scream. Three people rushed in, she recognized two of them, the mute man called Niles and Richard.

Owen was too busy hiding in the shadows, she didn't understand the words they were saying, the shouts, the angry shouts and the orders because she wasn't listening to anything but her own heartbeat.

"I'll stay!" she heard Richard shout, and his shout was so unlike him, all furious and desperate, and when they all left – everyone but Richard.

Owen felt the panic lower itself fast, like water rushing out and she could breathe again instead of drowning. And with that, she could also keep her voice steady and head high.

"What the hell?" she said and stepped out from the dark. Richard was putting the lamp up on the table again, lightening up the tent and she could see his face.

"What did he say?" he asked her.

Owen shook her head, not knowing what else to do. "He's alive."

"I – we know."

"He's alive," she repeated, and she felt her legs go wobbly underneath her, she had to sit down, soon, or she was going to fall, but she couldn't bring herself to move. "He's alive. No, I saw him. I hit him. He wasn't breathing. I left him. He wasn't breathing anymore. Richard, he wasn't alive."

She hadn't realized Richard had been walking towards her until he gently took both of her arms and led her back to the bed. A smartass comment flew through her head – buy me dinner first – but _he was alive._

Owen couldn't close her mouth, she felt like she was about to cry. She didn't cry. Owen didn't cry. She hadn't even cried at the private funeral, at the little headstone, too small to belong to an adult. She just kept her mouth open because if she closed it she wouldn't be able to breathe.

Richard spoke, "One of us found him in the jungle… he was hurt, Owen, but not close to dying. When you got here… we found it best to have him avoid you, Ben didn't – we didn't – want you to lose your head over something like this."

"I told you I killed him," Owen said, still out of it. "I thought, since I had already murdered someone I could –" She didn't finish the sentence.

"Sayid may not be one of Ben's most trusted, but he's… He is one of us now and he obeys by our rules and he won't lay a single finger on you. I swear."

If Owen would have looked at Richard that moment, she would have seen how his eyes were gazing at her, and that he meant every single word far more than she could ever imagine, but she didn't. She stared at nothing and thus understood nothing but confusion.

"I was just shocked," she said, convincing herself, "just a minor… issue. Surprise, that's all. He's alive, great for him. Wonder how Claret felt about that."

"Claret doesn't know."

But Owen wasn't listening to him. "I saved her, you know, I know I betrayed them all, for the bloody better good but I saved her. Ben should be damn grateful 'bout that."

Richard said nothing, but he stayed with her until she asked him to leave, which wasn't until morning, and that was a long time.

**. .**

"I don't… I just have a bad feeling about it, is all," Zidler explained. They were trying to go to sleep, but Margo was too awake and Zidler kept talking and talking and talking, going from hyper over getting rescued to bitter over Fox to suspicious about Jack and Claire.

"You always have a bad feeling about everything don't you?" Margo finally snapped, but there came no answer, because Zidler, the bastard who had kept her awake, had fallen asleep in a second.

She left their new shelter and went out, she saw a few people up, but no one who was alone or noticed her, until she saw a familiar shape in the distance by an also familiar palm tree.

"You couldn't sleep either, huh?" Margo asked with a smile.

Fred looked up and watched Margo sit down beside him by the tree he had spent so much time with before the survivors had learned the truth about him.

"No." Fred sighed.

Margo unconsciously put a hand on her belly, Fred was too aware of that fact. He shifted uncomfortably.

"It's happening tomorrow, isn't it?" she asked softly. "With Jack and Claire returning. It's all leading down to tomorrow?"

"Yes…" Fred said grimly, but then he turned to her and his face shone with a smile. "Or the day after tomorrow, probably then it's all doomed."

Margo laughed. "Rescue," she whispered.

"Rescue," Fred repeated. Rescue, rescue, rescue, if only he could be sure that was what would happen. He knew Milou, Miles and Janna had other missions, he had another mission, but he wanted to help these people.

"It doesn't feel quite right," Margo said suddenly, "it just doesn't. I can't believe I'm repeating Zidler's words that he totally stole from _Star Wars_ – but I have a bad feeling about this."

Fred understood what she meant, but he still asked, "Why?"

"Everyone's not here. Sean, Ellie, so many others… it doesn't feel right. I don't think… I know I have the 'unborn child' and all, but I don't think I want to leave before I know everyone else has too, you know?"

Fred knew all too well.

"I don't think you are going to leave as soon as possible either?"

Fred shook his head.

"It's about – it's about Flor, isn't it?"

Fred nodded.

Margo was silent for a moment. "It's hard to imagine all the things Zidler tells me. He talks… he talks about getting a house. He talks about all the money we're going to get, all the things we can do with it. I told him I'd give it all away to charity and he just smiled and said that was okay because he had enough for the both of us."

Fred didn't even ask her why she was telling him these things, he had gotten used to the fact that Margo often needed to vent to him. He just pushed his glasses up and listened.

"I have nightmares. I – I often wake him up in the middle of night with me raging, trashing around. He just soothes me until I go back to sleep."

She buried her head in her hands, and Fred still understood all too well. There was no rage like in a dream, no frustration and no helplessness compared.

"When we leave, what's expected of us, he got it all planned out. Everything. It's not even _his_ baby. I haven't even properly told him I love him. This seems like the stupidest problem right now. I know. But… he's so sure he loves me, and I just don't know if we're going to make out it alive before this is all over."

"Some of us don't want to rescue you," Fred blurted out. "That's not the primary reason we're here."

"I know," Margo replied, looking out into the dark sea and the hints of a sunrise at the horizon, "that's what I was saying."

**. .**

"He's here? Behind that door?"

Locke nodded; Sawyer pulled away the vines, giving Locke a nod back as he stepped inside first.

He saw a person sitting against the wall, bound, gagged with a bag over their head.

Sawyer almost laughed, making a surprised chuckle. "Son of a bitch! You got him. You really kidnapped the little bastard." He rushed over to the person, pulled off the bag, but the fact that met him was not the face of Ben Linus.

"What the –"

The door closed behind him.

**. .**

"Hello, Claret."

She had been falling asleep; startled she looked into the eyes of Sean. He was very close to her, and his eyes were moving fast, and he seemed to be shivering, but he was talking and he was sitting up.

"S-Sean?"

"You need to tell me what happened between the Others capturing me and me ending up here," he said coldly.

And Claret did. She told him about Sawyer, she told him about him being drugged to a shivering, mindless mess. She told him how she had dragged him away from there. After a moment of hesitation, she explained the new drugs and the man called José Gonzales.

"I thought he was my father. But he wasn't," she said, missing the dark look in Sean's eyes, for him the name José Gonzales meant something completely else.

"He's not with the Others either. We have been working together for some time now. He revealed who my real father was. Anthony Cooper. He's not exactly the most charming person in the world. And then there is the fact that he won't tell me if he really killed my…"

But the rest of her words meant nothing to him.

Sean turned away from her, and grimaced.

Claret handed him the water and the bottle of pills.

**. .**

The cradle had broken in a storm they said. Claire didn't mind. She rocked Aaron to sleep on her own. Libby and Hurley had left her, thinking she would be going to sleep too, thinking her lack of words and aborted gazes was all trauma, but she had stayed up. How could she go to sleep after everything that had happened?

She was back, but it didn't feel like she was _back_. Before the camp had had a sense of… security. A sense that despite the possibility of a monster in the jungle and people wanting them hurt, she would be safe at the beach with her friends, but now there was nothing of that odd security left, only fear.

Jack believed they had escaped, thinking Juliet was on their side. Claire knew Juliet was there to make sure she would give her baby to the Others. What Juliet didn't know, was that Claire had entirely different plans, plans involving packing a bag with essential things and then leaving into the jungle with her child.

She just wanted to pretend, she thought she would have been able to, when she saw everyone again, all of their faces, but she felt so disconnected. She had seen Kaylee, and remembered the last time she had seen Kaylee, down in the Staff. And then Margo, with a growing belly, and everyone else who had changed in ways she couldn't see but just knew, knew it was all different and it was all worse.

She couldn't pretend. She thought briefly of Maddy and Allen escaping – they weren't here, neither was Ellie. She wondered if they were hiding out there in the jungle somewhere, maybe she would find them too.

She stood up; making sure the bag had what it needed. She could maybe pick up some more fruit on her way, but she couldn't carry too much. She had to be quick and swift to get out of there and past all the traps lined around the camp.

"Claire."

Claire whirled around, she saw Jack step inside, Juliet in tow. She stared wide-eyed at them.

"Juliet…" She glanced at the duffel bag, wondering how she could explain it all away, beg _please don't hurt Brian._ She looked at Jack; did the other survivors know she was there?"

"Don't scream," Jack said, "they don't know she's here yet. We need to talk."

"Jack knows," Juliet said, and her voice sounded soothing. "I told him everything – Claire, I helped Flor escape. I helped her the first time she came to us and then again. I helped Jack. I've lied to Ben. We have the time to sort things out now."

"T-time?" Claire stuttered. She glanced at Aaron sleeping in the bundle. "He has Brian, he's got so many else, there is nothing… I don't know what to do."

"Claire," Juliet said, "you need to decide what's more important to you, your son or Brian."

"Are you asking me to choose between life and –"

"No!" Juliet interrupted her. "I'm trying to make you choose to take a risk. This is not going to be simple. Ben did send me here to infiltrate, to do so many other things, but I'm not going to do that. We need you on our side when we're going to tell everyone here."

"Tell them what? And why did you leave, what did you get?" Claire asked in a whisper, she felt like her legs were going to give out.

Jack and Juliet exchanged one of their glances again.

Juliet opened her backpack and took out a strange mechanism. "It's a satellite phone," she explained. "To contact the freighter, so we call all get off this island. Together. And why I was really here?"

She took a step closer to Claire. She looked down before looking up. "Was, in a short sense of words, to make sure Ben would get you, get Aaron, and everyone else he needs."

**. .**

Locke waited patiently outside the door, hearing his father say one of his many names – Sawyer – he could hear it snap inside the Sawyer he had come to know's head.

Locke didn't say anything or move or make any sound as he heard the last gurgles of Anthony Cooper's, the man who had ruined his life, the last attempts at breathing, and the silence.

When the silence had lasted for a few moments, he opened the door and met James's eyes.

"I'm so sorry for this," he said, and he meant it. If there had been any other way – but there hadn't been. James was now irrevocably beyond repair, after everything he had seen, and this, and Locke was sorry for that, but hoped that James would find his path again, perhaps if he went back…

But Locke knew, and James knew, that James would end up like the body behind him.

Dead.

**. .**

Kim wasn't sleeping either. Fox had been taken away from her to speak with Desmond, Andrea, Lori and Milou. This had concluded in her not going to sleep at all, anxiously pacing back and forth. laying down, standing up, tapping her fingers, trying to read, words getting mixed together until she read them backwards, and in the end – Andrea had come out of the shelter they were discussing in alone.

Kim cornered her immediately. "Let him stay," she said quickly before Andrea could run away or shout at her.

"No," Andreas said, she didn't sound so harsh though, but still determined.

"You need him, you brought him back, we can't leave him here…"

"He doesn't deserve to go with us," Andrea said, her voice shivering.

"Andy – he's helping you, isn't he? Even after you let him go out there to die alone! I'm not asking you to forgive him I'm just… Andy… p-please." Her voice sounded broken. She saw Andrea waver, tears in the corner of her eyes.

"I know you love him," Andrea said slowly, sadly, putting a hand to cover her face, like she didn't want Kim to see her hurting over it, "but that is not an excuse, Kim. I should know it isn't."

Kim backed away. "Jack and Claire returned," she said.

"Yes, yes they did."

"You should ask Fox what he thinks about that." And she left, walking away from Andrea's stuttering sounds, almost-words, and almost-regrets.

**. . . .**

How they ended up here, after wet cigarettes, tendencies of stalking and a long conversation over the cooling French fries they had ordered, she wasn't entirely sure of. She had seen it coming, of course. But Kim a few years back – even a year back – would have never talked to him in the first place.

"You will get lung cancer," Kim told him, watching him. He turned around, there were clouds on the sky but a small stream of sunshine still found a way to hit his face, it only made him look even more colorless against the contrast of the dirty black city in the background.

"I had no idea." Simon took the cigarette away from his mouth, lowered his arm, some trailing up. "You have completely utterly turned my world upside-down."

"Oh, get off it," she said, laughing a little as she'd said it in an accent very much like his.

"Oh no." Simon stomped on the cigarette, didn't bother to throw it into the trash can like he usually did ("That will catch on fire one day," Kim used to say) and strolled over to the bed before climbing on it. "I mean it. You, Kimika Yamazaki, have changed my world."

She struggled back on her elbows, giggling a little as he crawled over her body.

"Rocked it," he said. "Spun it around to wildly kick it around." He leaned down, and kissed her.

"Up." Kiss. "Side." Kiss. "Down." Kiss.

It wasn't like they were in love. Kim knew what love was, she believed in it. She had seen love fade away between her parents, seen her sister cry every night, face hidden, red-rimmed eyes in the morning, she'd seen her brother defy her parents to visit that girl with the ring in her nose and she'd experienced it herself. She'd felt flutters in her tummy and annoyance and jealousy and warmth and safety and craziness, she'd felt long hugs and awkward conversations and a familiar smell and a mouth and body that fit perfectly to hers, and she'd felt the pain of having all of that being ripped away from her, stomped on, and the hollowness in her chest, behind the tears, inside every corner of her skin.

This was not love. This was her and Simon, and they knew from the first moment they saw each other that it was going to mean something, something grand and or something ugly, but not like that.

Kim wasn't bothered by the knowledge, and so one day when she knocked on Simon's door, walked in and saw that it was empty – the stove was there, the bed, but no pack of cigarettes, no food in the fridge, he'd gone. She felt ache, the kind of ache you feel when you lose a friend, but not the hollowness of having something amazing, something promising taken away.

Kim always knew she was going to see him again, but when she did much later in life after they both had experienced things almost no one could dream of, she never expected to feel fury over it.

But that was later, and this was now, and now Kim was struggling with her bills and struggling with the emotions that came with Angela and Jared visiting once again.

And nothing got better when one of the regulars at the club actually tried to offer her money to do a lot more than just dance after the show.

She thought of what Simon had said to her, once, he might have been a little drunk, but the words still etched themselves inside her mind: "Your are meant for great things, Yamazaki."

She quit her job, and it was with little surprise and more sadness she heard of her parents' death the day afterwards.

**. . . . **

"Why didn't you tell me Sayid Jarrah was alive?" Owen threw him a short glance, and then she looked at the corner of the tent.

Ben though was looking at her, only her. "Because that was Jacob's will."

"I see you and Richard use the same notes." Owen snorted, still talking to the corner. "Why would Jacob not want me to see the man I didn't murder? And don't you dare say anything like 'Jacob works in mysterious ways.'"

"Why don't you ask Jacob yourself?"

Owen now looked at him, to see if he was serious. Ben stared right back. His hand was shivering, just slightly.

"Yes, may I?" Owen faked a honey dripping smile. "See him, I mean?"

"I'm afraid that is not possible."

"And why is that, Ben?" She crossed her arms, walked slowly closer to him.

"You do not get to visit Jacob, he summons you."

"That sounds like a hell of a lot of crap, Ben. So he calls you, then? And the others?"

"He only talks to me," Ben said slowly.

"Ain't that convenient?" Owen stopped. "Wizard of Oz, cute little movie with a chick called Dorothy, yellow brick-road, all those things. Ever heard of the phrase 'man behind the curtain?' So not even Richard gets to see him?"

"I said I was the only one —"

"Take me to him."

"No."

"I am not Richard. I am special, ain't I? Everyone says so. And I've just made my sacrifice, I think I deserve this. Don't you?"

"No."

"Huh... so. You are not letting me to see Jacob, and I'm telling everyone that you're a fraud. That Jacob doesn't exist. Good to have it figured out. Goodbye."

"Wait —"

She turned around, the smile gone. "Jacob doesn't exist. He's just somethin' you made up. You're a good liar, except for the shivering hand. It's all in the details."

Ben's hand stopped shivering. "Jacob does exist," he said again in the same determined but slightly frustrated tone.

"Then take me to him."

"All right. I will. We'll leave tomorrow morning."

"Tomorrow morning?" Owen yelled.

Ben stared at her. He spoke in short breaths, "It might have escaped you but you are not or main priority here."

Owen knew she was fighting a lost battle, but when had she ever backed away from even that? "Then who is?"

"Eva."

They stared at each other.

"Eva?" Owen asked, taken aback.

Ben nodded slowly, almost looking smug. "She's gone and we'd like to find her, so after we've moved. Tomorrow morning."

**. . **

"Are you coming with me?" Sean asked, turning to look at Claret.

Claret shook her head. "I… I can't. I have to go back now."

A breeze made her dark curls fall in front of her face, and she looked very fragile there next to him.

"All alone?" he asked.

"I'm not all alone," she said, and Sean thought of a memory – a yellow file, a man exchanging bottles of pills with Claret before disappearing.

Sean wanted to care a little more, wanted to argue, but it was all he could muster. The world was colorless, Claret's face lifeless, his fingers numb and his insides hollow.

"All right. Anything you wish for me to tell them?"

"They cannot trust Fox," she said. "And something will happen soon. Ben is planning something but I don't know what."

"Full of information, aren't you?"

"Just remember two pills a day."

"Why thank you, doctor."

They stood next to each other, still, for just a moment longer before Claret took a deep breath.

"Bye, Sean. I – I hope you can forgive me. Someday."

Sean walked away first, towards the camp with heavy steps. They were all assembled, looking like they were arguing with each other, every one of them.

Claret walked away, but she kept her gaze on his back when he stepped out on the beach, and didn't disappear into the trees until she saw Wendy noticing him.

**. .**

**Author's Notes:** Sorry for the long wait. Won't abandon this story again, I promise. I was just procrastinating everything by being awkward and by the fact that I do not own that ability to make decisions. My promise is very much in the freaky Janna "I never break a promise way" so you can be sure I'll hold it.

Namaste.


	53. I Heard Many Things, Part 1

_I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. _I heard many things_ in hell. How, then, am I mad?_

- Edgar Allan Poe

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 44, I Heard Many Things, Part 1**

**. .**

_With the soft and silent determination only a child who had lost everything could have, the little girl with the green cap crawled towards the body lying on the floor. She raised her shivering hand, but before she could touch the man's arm (to check, make sure, tug, ask why he was lying there in all the red), another hand grasped the little girl's and pulled her to her feet. The little girl's tear-stained face was yellow from the lights of the store, which flickered._

"_Come on." The bigger hand, belonging to someone much taller, much older, and far calmer, pulled at the girl with the green cap's hand. The little girl did not move but stared at the body. The blood coming from him created rivulets on the dirty aluminum floor._

"_Come on. We have to leave." The woman didn't wait for the little girl to agree, dragged her away from the scene, the little girl wailed._

"_Be silent," she ordered. But the child didn't understand (why was he just lying here, who was this woman, what was happening?) and she whimpered, she scratched with her little nails to get loose._

_The woman pulled her behind the checkout counter, where another body, this one with a nametag, was also sprawled out in another puddle of blood. The sign above them telling which products where on discount was hanging lose on the side._

"_Madeline." The woman knelt down in front of the little girl. Her hair was dark brown, curling down at the ends below her shoulders, and her eyes were brown and serious and completely indifferent to the other body close to them. "Shut the hell –"_

A gun pressed against her forehead. Rain fell hard against her skin and deep blue eyes flashed inside her mind. She spun around through thick green trees.

"A pen."

She blinked, and stared into the tired brown eyes of a man standing on the other side of the counter.

"A p-pen?" she stuttered.

"Yes, may I please borrow a pen?" When she didn't do anything other than gape like a fish, he rolled his eyes. With an implacable accent he continued, "Sharp, pointy thing, can be ink or –"

She turned around before he could finish the sentence and knocked into a woman. She wobbled but stayed on her feet. "What are you doing, Mads?" the woman shouted, barely rescuing the coffee cup from a terrible fate. She straightened the nametag – _Cassie Garcia_ – and walked out to serve the customers sitting around tall round tables. Outside, Maddy saw the rain falling onto the pavement and something driving by.

"Fine then, no pen," the man said, running a hand through his blonde hair. "Freak," he added. The bell tingled when he left.

"Take these to tables two and three." Someone pushed a tray into her hands, but Maddy stood frozen, unable to process everything at once. The people around her, dressed in white and black with red aprons saying _ANNA'S – IS THE BEST _with big capital white letters, music playing from somewhere above her, the smell of caffeine and sugar and sweat filled her nostrils.

"Where…?" she said, but the one word question was low and quiet and nobody heard her, she was pushed out from behind the counter and had to balance the tray the best she could.

"Sweetheart, over here!" someone called out. A middle-aged balding man waved her over. She hurried over to his side and put the tray down on the table.

"Where am I?" she asked, she had never seen him before in her life, and he had clearly not done that either, but everyone seemed to know what they were doing as they rushed past her to serve and to take orders. Another vehicle drove by, spraying water on the sidewalk. She felt like she was about to faint. It was all too fast.

"What?" the man asked, taking the cup and biscuit and bread off the tray himself.

"Who… what is this place?" Maddy asked, leaning forward, the man leaned back, biscuit half-way to his mouth as he stared at her.

Someone grabbed the tied knot of her apron, making her stumble back. "You're upsetting the customers. What is wrong with you today?" It was the same woman she'd knocked into.

"Where am I?" Maddy asked. She felt like she was close to tears, the young woman kept staring into her eyes but she couldn't meet them.

"Mads…" the woman didn't sound angry anymore but worried, and she placed her hand on her shoulder.

Maddy ran for the door.

It tingled.

The world was swimming in front of her eyes. She stopped running when it had stopped raining on her. She looked up and saw a balcony above her. She looked down at her drenched clothes. She was wearing exactly the same outfit like the others – the waiters, waitresses – had been wearing, white and black with a red apron. She fumbled with the nametag for a moment before bringing it up to look at it.

_Madeline Sumatose._

She inhaled sharply. The nametag fell down on the ground. She almost pinched herself, thinking it was a dream. It wasn't though, she could tell the difference between dream and reality unlike Jim who had been mad at her an entire day for thinking she'd stolen his dog. _He didn't even own a dog_.

That thought led to her thinking of Jim, what must have happened to him, after Garrett, Garrett with the gun. He had been pointing it at her head, just now, and now she was here. She blinked hard, not knowing if it was rain or if it were tears running down her face.

"Mads? Maddy?"

Maddy didn't look up. She heard the words, her name, out there with the rain and the wind and the sounds of cars rushing by, the sound of shoes clicking against the street, the doors slamming. She didn't realize they were meant for her, before someone's hand reached out to touch her face.

She flinched back, choking back a sob and looking up into brown eyes.

She almost didn't recognize him. It took a few seconds before she remembered who the strong jaw and dark skin belonged to. He was holding a red umbrella that did little to stop the rain from drenching his sweater and jeans.

"What are you doing here?" Brian Haligan asked. He reached out for her again but she stumbled back.

"You…" she whispered.

"Aren't you supposed to be at work? Has something happened?" He didn't touch her again. His hands were twitching though like he wanted to. They were not bound. His face was not bruised. He looked little like Brian Haligan was supposed to do.

"Where are we?" Maddy asked him, standing her ground, putting her head a little higher. Her body was still shivering after the sobs but her voice was strong. Not showing the weakness that was so obvious.

"A block away from where you are supposed to be working. Are you all right?"

Maddy shook her head. "Where's…" _Brian had last been a prisoner_. "Where's Ben? Where's Boone?"

"Who are you talking about? Are you…" Brian swallowed. "Let's get you back to your place, right? I'm calling Ellie."

"Who?" Maddy backed away. Brian hadn't recognized the names. Wherever they were, he hadn't met Ben, met Boone. She was not going to trust this Brian, this free sweater-wearing Brian in this weird world. She had been taught better.

She turned around to run when her foot caught in something, a crack in the asphalt. She slipped, feet losing connection with the ground before her sight went white with pain.

**. .**

"She turned around and slipped."

"But she's got a bruise on her head?"

"And she hit her head."

"Poor Sweet Pea."

"Should we take her to the hospital?"

"Let's see when she comes to it."

"She was talking crazy before. She looked at me like she didn't recognize me. She asked me about these names and –"

"That might be an effect from hitting your head? She told me you weren't very bright."

"She told you what? And… and she's wearing her work clothes. I'm not an expert on her schedule –"

"Cassie, she works with Maddy, called me telling me she had run off unexpectedly."

"I don't know who that is. But I better be going, give me a call later – Maddy has my number. She's going to be okay, isn't she?"

"Of course."

"Remember to call me?"

"I sure will."

A door closed. Maddy was forced to lie down. The girl kept talking to her, asking how she felt, how many fingers she was holding up, if she wanted soup and tea, and then when Maddy didn't answer, the girl began talking to herself: "I shouldn't have let Brian go." "Oh god, she's gone mute." "What's the number to 911?" "Where are the teabags?" "Mads, where are the teabags?"

Maddy sat up. The girl walked over and forced her to lie down again in the couch with a sure press of her small hands. Maddy didn't recognize her, even if she could see clear and her head had not been throbbing, she wouldn't know who it was.

She regained more control of the situation though when the girl tried to make her take a pill.

She slapped her hand away, and the glass fell, not breaking but rolling over the floor. The girl shrieked as Maddy pushed her away.

"What the hell are you doing?" she yelled. "It' just a painkiller!"

Maddy tried to stand up, but fell back against the cushions. The world was spinning.

"That's it!" the girl shouted. "I'm taking you to the ER."

Maddy didn't respond. She didn't know what this "ER" was but she didn't like the sound of it. She saw the girl with pick up a phone as she walked away from her sight. She could just see the swirl of her blonde hair; her eyes were not on Maddy.

Maddy took it slower this time, but she couldn't bring herself to stand up just yet. She crawled over the floor until she reached the hallway. Taking a second to collect herself, she opened the door and out –

To the stairs.

She stared at the massive obstacle before her, she gulped. There was no possibility she would make it. Still, she tried to take the first couple of steps before she collapsed, one leg hanging down the other step, head leaning against the wall.

She heard the girl shriek, a shriek of realizing Maddy was gone, and a few seconds later she was being pulled back in the room.

"This is a disaster," she said, "We're going."

The girl draped a dry coat over her and put boots on her feet. Maddy let her; going meant going away, which means larger chance for her to escape. And true, she was also feeling like all her limbs were made of pins and needles.

"We're going to the hospital, just a check-up," she continued, and Maddy could still not place her face, even though she clearly treated Maddy like she knew her, like they knew each other enough for her to drag and nag and worry.

"What's this…?" Maddy couldn't help but mumble as she was pulled into the vehicle.

"It's a car, oh dear, you do remember what a car is? Mads, who is the current president?"

"Is the who?" Maddy muttered, and then turned silent. It was no worry, because even though she could barely make out the words the girl had launched into a long story about these presidents and something that she called a ford.

Maddy could only recall one ford, and that was because Jim had walked around with the said James Ford's picture wondering when they were going to take him _"because look at him."_

She wondered where Jim was.

When she got out, wherever out was, she needed to find him. Again.

The girl's story was cut short when they stopped; Maddy threw up, luckily not inside the "car", but outside on the street. The girl held her, and helped her inside where no rain was smattering down and Maddy was simply so grateful for being able to sit down again. _Motionless, _so worn-out and still she forgot all things escaping.

"We're short of staff at the moment. Sorry." An apologetic voice sounded, but with a hint of untruth. "What happened here…?"

"Elizabeth, Ellie. Uh, Mads here, she hit her head and then she was all weird and tried to push me away and then she asked me what a car was and she just ran out from work, uh, before hitting her head."

"I was mostly directing the question to her actually, sweetheart. No need to hear your ramblings."

Maddy looked up into the medical's face. She opened her mouth slightly, breathing out before saying his name, "Ivan."

The blue of his scrubs seemed too sharp in her eyes, his face was still his, but his hair different from the last time she had seen him alive before he had been killed by someone who preferred to be called Janna.

He raised his eyebrows. "Ivan is my name. Now, Madeline Sumatose, can you tell me how you got the wound on your head? The nurse looked at it and said it didn't need stitches, but there is a chance at a small concussion."

"Don't call me that," she snapped.

Both the girl – Elizabeth? – and Ivan looked at her in surprise.

"I'm sorry?" Ivan said.

"It's Maddy. Not Mads, not Madeline. It's Maddy."

"Well, you can talk," he said and scribbled something down. "How do you feel?"

"Ivan, where are we?" Maddy asked, even though she knew that with great possibility, Ivan didn't recognize her as she did him.

"We're in the hospital…" Ivan's voice trailed off. "Hang on there."

He motioned for Elizabeth to follow him in a distance they both seemed to think would be safe from her ears, but she could still hear what they were discussing, even if their voices were hushed.

"Make her write down a list, answer basic questions, just some basics, I'll go see with Chapel if we can run some more tests on her. Don't let her fall asleep. Don't leave her side."

Elizabeth nodded at everything he said and accepted the piece of paper and pen like they were trophies.

Maddy watched her as she wrote down the questions. Elizabeth's hair was light blonde and curly despite the small drops of rain still falling from the tips, it framed her heart-shaped friendly face but from the cold fluorescent light her eyes looked more gray than blue.

Elizabeth bit her lip as she handed Maddy the paper. "Just some questions you can answer, right Mads – Maddy, I mean?"

Maddy was just waiting for Ivan to return with answers, but sighed, deciding to play along for the moment. ("Just pretend you are from outer space," Jim had said and shoved the costume he'd made for her into her arms for Halloween, "It's easy, you already talk like you're from Vulcan. Throw in some words like seldom and fascinating and put your hands behind your back and you got yourself a deal. Easy." Easy to say, not easy to do.)

**Your name**

Maddy resisted the urge to grimace, and wrote down _Maddy_.

**Your age**

The pen hovered over the paper.

She turned to the next question.

**Where you live**

She ignored that one.

**Where you work**

She bit her lip, and wrote down _ANNA'S_. She supposed she had been working there, as everyone repeated it.

**Your favorite reality TV show (hint: YOU KNOW)**

Maddy had to keep herself from uttering a loud "what?"

She skipped that question.

**Your roommate's name**

She felt like she could write down Elizabeth's name there, but she wasn't sure.

She was just about to read the next one when the paper was snatched away.

"What the hell?" Elizabeth said a little too loudly for it to be normal. "You know my name. You know all these things. What's wrong with you?"

"I do now know your name," Maddy said, blinking hard until there weren't two of her anymore. "I know your first name because you told it. I don't know what all these things are, I have no idea how I ended up at that place… at that work…" She looked around at the patients coughing and the old people that looked older than anyone she'd ever met, so old that they could barely walk. She saw a woman walk by with a baby in her arms. She knew nothing of this. This didn't belong in her world.

She looked back at Elizabeth whose eyes were filled with held back tears.

Maddy attempted to stand up, and everything blackened before her eyes, but a few moments later the black spots vanished and she could see again.

"Where are you going?"

Maddy walked out to the corridor, her feet dragging behind her, but everything was clearer somehow, and it wasn't from her sterile surroundings, no, she had a goal in sight.

She felt someone pull her back, Elizabeth of course. Maddy looked up into her eyes. "I'm not who you think I am. I am sorry."

She attempted to walk out the exit, but Elizabeth's grip on her arm was stronger than she thought.

"No," she said, and there was something fierce in her voice, "c'mon, we have to go back to that doctor and those nurses. You are not fine, Mads. Let's go." Her hand clung now to her arm as if in desperation. "You'll know me soon, who I am. Soon. Just come back."

Maddy shook her head, felt the world coming undone again, swimming a little but she could handle it. "I need to find Jim Al. That is what I need to do."

With strength not many people knew she had, she shook off Elizabeth's grip and stumbled outside.

Raindrops were no longer falling from the sky.

**. . **

Elizabeth had tried to follow her.

Maddy didn't know the streets, she had never seen buildings so tall and people so different, but she still knew how to hide fairly well. When she crouched between the lamppost and the large over-filled trash can she was reminded of huddling close with Ellie and Allen. Still hurt from the bullet and with Ellie asking too many questions too loudly about the people from the camp. She had tried to let Allen deal with her, but he didn't know how to be harsh, so Maddy had told Ellie that if she really loved the people back there she would forget them. Ellie's eyes had widened, and she'd gone silent, and they had all fallen asleep without saying goodnight.

The next day Ellie had taken her hand instead of her father's when they hiked to their next hiding place.

Maddy now realized what an unreasonable choice it had been to leave the hospital. Her head throbbed, and she was not worried about medical attention (Ivan, she thought, sadly, remembering what the twins had told her of the scene when they had found his body), but she had no idea where to begin.

This was a city, nothing like the Barracks, a city that she had once longed for, a place in a fairytale Liz told her every time before she went away. Glimmering houses, taller than she could imagine, people, more than hundreds, more than thousands, people who could be anything they wanted.

Maddy looked over to where she saw a woman with tangled black hair and sad eyes beg for money in the street corner. She did not look like she had everything she wished for.

Where could she find Jim in this place that just seemed more and more endless the more she went on? And Brian, Ivan, none of them had seen her; they had looked at her but not seen_ her_. Brian had been a prisoner. Ivan had been dead. And know they were both here, different people, same faces.

She startled. Standing up straight from the crouched position, a signal, loud and irrigating sounded and the pocket of her coat kept vibrating. Scared of what she'd find, she closed her hands around a small little device. She stared at the small screen, a phone, ringing, and the name: _Brian._

"Gonna answer that?" a passer-by shouted.

Perhaps it was like a walkie-talkie. She tried to speak to it, but the ringing continued, she began to press the buttons and then –

"_Hi – hello_?"

"Hello," she said very loud and clear. She considered shouting.

"_Mads? You all right?"_

"Who is this?"

"_B-Brian._" She did not know Brian stuttered. "_You okay? You were pretty out of it earlier. Can I come over_?"

"I – I do not know where I am."

"Is that a car?" Brian asked. Maddy saw one of the vehicles rush by, spurting up even more water on the sidewalk.

"Where am I?" she asked, lump in throat.

"_Is Elizabeth with you?_"

"Brian, what is going on?" Not answering his question, but he could put two and two together.

"_Okay, okay._" It sounded like he was taking deep breaths. "_Just tell me where you are. Do you see any street signs?_"

"I see a lot of garbage." She looked at the trash cans.

"_So about every single street_," Brian breathed out.

She looked at the building on the opposite side of the street. "There – it says public state library."

"_You sure Elizabeth isn't with you?_"

"She is not here, and I do not want her here."

"_Just wait and I'll come get you, okay? Can you give me Elizabeth's number?_"

"I do not want her here. What do you mean with –"

"_Never mind, I'm on my way. Just… just stay put_."

Maddy stayed, hiding the best she could in the shadows, whole body colder and colder with every second from the rain, head still pounding, but it all eased when she saw someone step out from a yellow vehicle. Brian.

She did not know if she could trust him, but at least she knew who he was unlike Elizabeth who she had never seen before in her life.

She walked right out on the street. She heard a loud signal and quickened her steps; Brian met her half-way and dragged her onto the sidewalk.

"Are you insane?" he shouted and pulled her into the vehicle he'd come out of. She seated herself as far away from him as possible.

"Perhaps," she mumbled to herself.

"You could've gotten hit by a car, seriously. Mads, just this morning you were…" He took a look at her head, but the wound was hidden by her hair. "Where is Elizabeth? Did she take you to the hospital?"

Maddy was silent.

"We're going back to your place –"

"No," Maddy said immediately.

Brian sighed. "Okay, we'll go back to mine, but then you better call that roommate of yours before she thinks I kidnapped you."

They kept quiet as the driver followed Brian's instructions back to his home.

Maddy gazed out the window, they passed many more similar vehicles – cars – blue, yellow, silver, black. There were lampposts, but with red and green and yellow lights, and they changed and they stopped and she could see slightly through the darkened windows the other people sitting in the cars. Children playing, people with stern looks, some with tired harried faces, she tried to connect them to the island, to everyone she knew there, but they were strangers.

Maddy gasped when they passed a building leading higher up in the sky than anything she had ever seen, like a mountain, made of glass and silver but far more fragile. She had heard of them, in a book she read. She thought: skyscrapers.

It was getting darker, and the sky was a dark blue when they stopped. Brian hesitated, but Maddy climbed out of the vehicle herself, even though her legs felt wobbly and she still felt lightheaded.

"Is this all yours?" she couldn't help but asking, staring up at the building, it wasn't as tall as the skyscraper, but it was tall.

"You have been here before," Brian said and walked up the couple of stairs to press in a combination of numbers into a device.

"I do not remember that."

"The elevator's broken…" Brian looked even more uncertain.

"The what is?"

They walked up the stairs, Brian always looked like he wanted to support her, but Maddy flinched away from him.

"Be quiet," Brian suddenly whispered to her.

Maddy stared, confused, but tried to walk slightly less loud as they passed a door. Brian carefully picked out his keys to unlock the door, slow and silent.

The door creaked slightly and Brian ushered her inside.

He closed it, locked it, and breathed out as if they'd run a marathon. "My neighbor," he explained, "it's impossible to escape her."

Maddy didn't even pretend she knew what he was speaking about; she was too busy untangling herself from the mess on the floor.

"You want to borrow a dry shirt? You can change while I call Elizabeth…" Brian's voice trailed off. Maddy had already gone away from the hallway into the great room.

Every chair, the couch, the table, the kitchen counters, every bit of space was covered in clothes, books and things. Things like maps, colorful mugs, empty jars, a baseball bat, something that looked like it had once been a casserole and a plastic skull.

Maddy walked over and picked up the plastic skull, she stared into the empty sockets. Inside the skull someone had drawn a heart with a pink sharpie.

"It says from Maddy," she said.

"You gave it to me."

"Why?"

"Because you won it at the fair…" He looked weird again, worried. "What's Elizabeth's phone number?" he asked and looked away.

"I will write it down."

"Okay."

They looked at each other.

"You said you would get me dry clothes."

"Right, right." Brian left for the hallway, probably on his way to his bedroom. Maddy scanned the room and the horrible mess, where could she start? She had to be quick.

She began by shuffling through everything to find pieces of writing, small notes. A list of groceries, numbers written down which she crumpled and put inside her coat pocket, everything was information.

She heard Brian return, and hastily positioned her to a stoic form.

"Do you know Jim Al?" she asked as Brian handed her the flannel shirt.

"No, never heard of him." Brian laughed, as if he had yet to tell her the point of the joke but couldn't contain himself. He gave her the phone and put it in her other hand.

Maddy tilted her head to the side, confused.

"You gonna call Elizabeth?" Brian nodded at the phone.

"I don't know how," Maddy whispered, still holding the shirt and phone in air.

Maddy cried out when the phone in her hand suddenly began to ring loudly. She dropped it, jumped away from it. She almost tripped on a hat on the floor in her haste.

Brian stared at her; she could almost hear his mind chant "_crazy, crazy, crazy_" and he bent down to answer it.

"Elizabeth? Yeah, she's here."

**. .**

"I did a little internet research." Elizabeth returned with loud words and air filled with cigarette smoke as she swirled around Maddy. Elizabeth had been eerily sweet to her, blaming everything on her head wound.

"And it turns out," she said and flopped down on the couch, "that you should be around familiar things but I shouldn't push you, which means I shouldn't like, force you to remember or whatever or something, this amnesia thing, so." She grabbed the little device of the table (remote, not weird flickering device which was one of Liz's words for it) and with it she turned on the television.

Maddy stared, the quality, the brightness, the people speaking too quickly and too much. She winced. She was unaccustomed with their whole living area, living in such a large building, but only in a few rooms. Many of the things in the living area she had never seen before in her life.

"What is this?" she asked. This was nothing like the grainy movies she had seen back on the island.

Elizabeth bit her lip like she tried to calm herself down. "They fix people," she said slowly. "We watch this every week…" She glanced at Maddy for a reaction, recognition, but Maddy just looked confused. "Seriously…"

The words "fixing", "they will shine" sounded.

"Are the people sick?" Maddy asked.

Elizabeth couldn't help herself and gave Maddy a dark look. "Uh, sick as if in sick fashion sense. _Yes_."

A woman's wardrobe was being inspected by two colorful dress-clad tall women. "Why are they complaining about her clothes?"

"Because," Elizabeth spluttered, "they don't frame her body nicely."

"What does it matter?"

Elizabeth crossed her arms. "Are you insulting our – my favorite show?"

Maddy continued to watch it in silence, but she found herself bored and irrigated by their high-pitched voices and by the absurdity of the thing. "I do not see how this is entertaining."

Elizabeth scoffed. "Why do you talk like that?"

"Like what?"

"'I do not' and 'I cannot' it's I don't and I can't."

Silence.

"You speak like some boring ol' professor," Elizabeth muttered. She seemed to regret it a moment later, her eyes softening. "Sorry, I mean, you've had a rough day, I shouldn't be… it's just, we've had a couple of rough weeks, with you know – everything. And… well, you don't know, uh, do you?"

Maddy was not sure she wanted to know. Her head was throbbing again. "I am tired."

"You do remember which room is yours? I shouldn't have let you out of that hospital I –"

Maddy had no clue, but she could guess which was hers by excluding the room with pink things in it with a smell of cigarette smoke.

Elizabeth shouted, "I'll check on you every other hour to see if you're still breathing!"

Maddy closed the door to her room; sure that Elizabeth would also confirm if she was still there.

The first thing that crossed her mind was 'this is the home of a murderer'. She then calmed down when she realized the skull-shaped lamp was just a lamp and not a real skull. The whole room was cramped and small, seeming even smaller by the black curtains and the dark blue garments she'd put on the wall to cover, and failing to do so, the light purple tapestry.

The bed was unmade, and she shivered at the sight of the even messier floor, clothes were thrown haphazardly over the chest of drawers and another skull lamp in the corner. Luckily, she saw stacks of books, and was reminded of all the books Liz and Garrett used to keep, and she too eventually.

She made the bed (she would never forgive herself if she would fall asleep in an unnamed bed, Jim never understood her logic) before she picked up the first of the books. She flipped it open. She cringed at the first line, and then felt like she wanted the earth to swallow her whole at the next pages. Well, not every book she owned could be…

They could be just as horrible.

She couldn't imagine who could find the stories in the books, even the writing, one bit attracting.

But apparently she had, she, Maddy, Madeline Sumatose as they had called her. This world's Mads. There was a picture on the nightstand, of her and Elizabeth. Maddy was dressed in a black short dress, eyes sooty; Elizabeth was the complete opposite with light blonde curls and a long pink dress. She had no recollection of that moment, no feelings about it at all. This was not her; the person in the picture was not her. She could not forget that. This world was curious and wrong and she needed to find a way back, she needed to find Jim.

She also needed to find Garrett.

She didn't even undress before she put the covers over herself. Her eyes felt heavy, but it took long before she finally closed them.

Because she kept staring at the picture of her and Elizabeth, Elizabeth was making a grimace and Maddy was laughing, and while Maddy hadn't seen many pictures of herself, she had at least never looked as careless as she did in this one. She kept staring until it was etched inside her mind and even when she closed her eyes to finally sleep, she still saw it.

**. .**

"Mads, get off me!"

Maddy blinked, looked into Elizabeth's eyes for a moment before she remembered who she was – or the lack she knew of who she was. She stepped away from her, Elizabeth stood up carefully, brushing away breadcrumbs.

"I was just gonna bring you some toast!" she whined, gesturing at the bread now spread out over the floor before she stomped out of her room.

Her room.

Maddy hurried over to the window, outside was a gray-looking street with a single car driving by. There was a tree, but even though it reminded her of the island's it wasn't the same.

She was still there, there in the confusing land of skull-lamps and of Brian's kindness and – she stepped on the breadcrumbs – toast.

"In case you have forgotten," Elizabeth said, flinging herself around the room, picking up a bag, "my cell number is on the refrigerator and I asked Cassie to check up on you after work, which I have called you in sick for, anyway. So you should rest, your favorite movie is in the TV and I put cereals on the table instead."

Maddy said nothing.

Elizabeth managed to flash a smile as she left out the door. "You can thank me later!"

Her head did not hurt so much anymore, but she was still wobbly on her feet when she went over to eat from the cereal. She needed time to think over things. While she tasted the milk, she wondered if this was the world Liz so desperately wished to escape to all the time. She could not see the charm in any of it, she felt trapped, and there was nothing of the freedom she had imagined. Elizabeth watched her like a hawk, and even now when she was gone, she felt like she was being controlled by the walls surrounding her.

She finished her breakfast, and decided to explore. _Know your enemy, at least their weaknesses._

She walked into the other room beside her own, Elizabeth's. The walls were a light purple color as her own, but Elizabeth had covered up the walls with nothing more than pictures. She stepped over the dirty laundry on the floor (the majority of the clothes different shades of pink) to look at them.

She saw almost a replica of the one on her nightstand, just beneath one of herself with a flower in her hair. This Maddy looked younger than she was now, perhaps a few years back, and she was smiling.

The pictures were mostly of people, but not of people she recognized, but what struck her as odd was that a lot of the pictures seemed to have been cut off at some places, very neatly, but the difference in size was clear. She wondered who Elizabeth had been trying to cut away from all evidence of her life.

There was a book on her nightstand, Poe, _The Best Tales_. She flipped it through, and a note fell down.

_This is the best one –_

_Simon._

However she looked, she could not find where the note had been stuck, and what Simon had loved.

She jumped when the doorbell rang. She stumbled over the shoes and a bag on the floor, but before she opened it, she stopped herself. She had no idea who this was. It could be Elizabeth, having forgotten something on her way to… where?

"Maddy?" someone shouted from outside the door. She recognized the voice and deemed it enough reason.

"Hey," Brian said when she let him in.

"Hello," Maddy replied, carefully avoiding contact when she closed the door behind him. "What are you doing here?"

"Well, err." Brian shoved his hands inside his pockets. "After, yeah, yesterday, I wanted to see if you were all right. Better. Is Elizabeth here?"

Maddy shook her head. "She left."

"She left you alone?"

Maddy thought it was obvious.

"You're obviously not all right; I can't believe she'd leave you alone. You should be resting."

"I simply hit my head."

Brian wouldn't listen, and led her straight to the couch were he forced her to lay down before putting a blanket over her. She felt like a little child, but so far Brian was the only one she "knew" and she needed to know more.

"You hungry?" he asked.

"I need to find someone," Maddy said instead.

Brian stopped in his tracks to look at her curiously. "Um, all right… who?"

Maddy sat up, blanket still put over her legs. "How can I find someone here?"

Brian shrugged. "The internet?"

"The intrent?"

"Internet."

Maddy stared at him blankly.

He nodded at the strange thin machine Elizabeth had left half-open on the table.

"You know."

Maddy crossed her arms.

"You clearly don't know." He sighed. "Were you to the hospital –"

"It is called amnesia I believe."

"Oh," he uttered like it made everything fine, "_oh_."

Then Brian taught her how to manage a laptop.

**. .**

**Maddy Sumatose's search history:**

where are elizabeth chetwood and garrett speir

why am i here

how can i escape this place

where is garret speir

why can you not answer my questions

jim al

who is elizabeth

why is this brian so different from the one before

where is benjamin linus

am i insane

**. .**

Brian walked over to sit beside Maddy on the couch. He had been there for a couple of hours, talking absolute nonsense about his work at the office.

She was hunched over the laptop again, supporting it on her knees. He grabbed the tea cup he'd made her from her hand. She could not understand why, but he muttered something about "no liquids near technology rule."

"If you want to find out information about these… uh, people –" Brian began, having only seen part of her search history.

"Garret Speir and –" Maddy automatically corrected.

"Yeah, yeah," Brian interrupted, "you should go to the library."

Maddy was silent for a moment, processing the new information.

"It's a place where you can borrow books," he explained slowly.

"I know."

"You still look like a question mark,"

"A question mark?"

"You know." Brian looked flustered, she had never seen him look flustered, but after all, she had not concentrated or paid much attention to him much, but from Garrett's comments Brian had seemed to be the person who would never get embarrassed or awkward, just angry and defensive and bitter. But Garrett had always been a little tense in the shoulders about Brian _never picking the right things._

"You make that look with your eyes," he said, "tilt your head to the side, like you don't understand humanity…"

Before he could go too far, Maddy cut in, "I don't know the whereabouts of this library."

He raised his eyebrows. "You don't?"

She shook her head.

Brian looked very disbelieving. "I'll show you when you get better."

"I am better now," Maddy insisted and went to get her coat, Brian could not stop her.

**. .**

"You sure you don't recognize this place?" Brian asked for the hundredth time as they walked in the big wooden doors.

"Yes," Maddy said, trying to keep her calm. Her arms were still by her sides, and Brian kept touching the sleeve of her coat, was he afraid she would run away from him? She would not do that without a good reason, she needed her driver.

The place was quieter than usual when there was a big crowd, whispers and rustling came from people and the pages of books they were turning. Maddy looked around briefly, not knowing where to begin. The various rows of books were marked by letters and genre. She suddenly felt hopeless, she hardly knew what part of the world she was on, but she doubted it was the same place as Elizabeth and Garrett were from. She knew it was not the same time.

"Where can I find these books?" Maddy asked in a whisper to Brian, thinking this was how you did it. Libraries had always been described as serene and peaceful places in the books she read, and she understood now why. It had always been easier to read when Jim wasn't babbling in her ear about his latest escapade with Karl or about Felicity.

Brian led her to a thing called "the help desk."

He kept looking sheepish as he did so much to her confusion, but she understood it more when they arrived and the librarian with the blonde curls turned around.

"Mads!" Elizabeth exclaimed surprised, a little too loud for the peace around them. "What are you doing here? Oh, Brian, um, hello."

"You have a job here?" Maddy asked, looking back and forth from Brian and Elizabeth. According to the look on his face, he had known that fact.

"Of course. Mads, you were supposed to be home, resting." Elizabeth looked exasperated, and she smoothed out her skirt. Even here, she wore dark pink colors and even a little white bow in her hair. She looked at Brian like it was his fault.

Maddy decided not to inquire more of the circumstances; she could almost feel the tension. "I need books on the seventeenth century," she said. "Seventeenth century London."

"You could have asked me that at home," Elizabeth whispered. She looked around. "Come on, I'll show you."

She led them through rows and rows of books, up stairs speckled with white and by people sitting hunched over computers, books spread open beside them and then pass other rows and rows, until she led them to a section called the 1700th – 1800th century.

"Is this for you?" Elizabeth asked Brian.

"It is for me," Maddy corrected her, reading the titles. Nothing was specific enough.

"Oh… why?" she asked.

Maddy did not respond.

Elizabeth picked a red book from the shelf. "This is about the living arrangements, a very good overview of how it was like living there in the early century. Unless you want to read about the social stands, then –"

"People," Maddy said, "I want to know of the people."

"The living arrangements then –"

"No, the people living there. Their names. What happened to them."

Both Elizabeth and Brian exchanged a look between them of mutual bewilderment.

"Um," Elizabeth said. She picked out a few more books, dumped them in Brian's arms, and said she would be right back and left.

"The people?" Brian turned to her, all while trying to arrange the books in a way they would not fall to the floor.

"Yes, their names, I think you heard what I said the first time."

"Yeah… sure… any particular people?"

"Do the names Garret Speir and Elizabeth Grace Chetwood say anything to you?"

Brian shook his head.

Elizabeth came back. "This is a book with some data of the names of people living in London during…" Her voice trailed off since Maddy was already on her way away from them.

**. .**

Maddy had felt like a little child as Elizabeth and Brian argued in hushed voices about what to do with her. She had almost considered just leaving with the book she had, but had been distracted but all the others that were there. She had never seen so many books at the same time in her life.

In the end Elizabeth went off work and followed her home, while rambling of how she shouldn't have left the apartment and of what a complete jackass Brian was for letting her do so.

Elizabeth had moved the topic of conversation to erasers for some reason, and didn't silence until they stepped out of the elevator (which Maddy had been a bit terrified of.)

Outside the apartment, a woman was leaning onto their door. She had been wearing headphones which she pulled off as soon as she saw them, eyes flaring with anger.

"Check up?" the woman yelled. "Just check up on Maddy. It will take less than a minute. _Please._ We're friends."

Elizabeth took a step back, but the elevator door had closed and there was no room for her to escape.

"You are Cassie," Maddy said, recognizing her from _ANNA'S – IS THE BEST_.

"Where have you been?"

"I, we –" Elizabeth looked flustered.

"Doesn't matter." Cassie shook her head. "I am busy as hell trying to find out – I don't need this. I don't need any more friends abandoning me."

She rushed down the stairs, Elizabeth shouted after her but she didn't come back.

"I believe that was an overreaction," Maddy said when they were inside.

Elizabeth laughed, but her heart was not in it. "You know Cass. She's just… she's just not the same anymore after everything, you know."

Maddy was so tired of hearing that she knew, when she didn't. "I don't," she reminded her. "I do not know."

Elizabeth was also tired of realizing bit by bit that Maddy just didn't know anything at all.

"She changed after Lorraine's death," she said with a monotone voice. "Lorraine Hume. You know, the singer who was the next big thing after Owen Chauncey? She took an overdose. Cassie's the kind of friend we don't really want to have as a friend anymore but we're loyal to. Goodnight."

She closed the door to her room behind her.

It was not even dark outside yet.

Maddy stared at the wall.

**. .**

"I need you to tell me about Flight 815," Maddy said to Elizabeth the next day. She'd left her alone for the night, Maddy had read her books instead and slept for long dreamless hours, but now she needed to know.

"I'm too tired, Mads," Elizabeth said, sighing and closing her eyes. "I'm just too exhausted."

"You always speak too much and I need that of you now, I need you to tell me what happened."

"Promise me you'll stay in the apartment?" she asked in a low voice.

Maddy hesitated.

Elizabeth sighed again. "Flight 815 crashed. They looked, they couldn't find. Lots and lots of media coverage because the plane just disappeared, and also because famous rock star Charlie Pace was on the flight along with Olwyn Chauncey. It was all kind of a big deal. Now I need to go to work, so." Elizabeth left.

Maddy decided to search after the manifest, using the skills – or lack thereof – she managed to search for it. They had released it to the public.

Maddy read through the list of names, she had not memorized every passenger but those who had survived, and it was clear not everyone who had were on this manifest.

She recognized some of them:

Boone Carlyle, Olwyn Chauncey, Ana-Lucia Cortez, Michael Dawson, Sayid Jarrah, Jin-Soo Kwon, Sun Hwa-Kwon, John Locke, Sean O'Donnell, Frederic Phelps, , Hugo Reyes. Wendy Reyes, Elizabeth Smith, Shannon Rutherford, Margaret Tyler, Eko Tunde, and Montgomery Zidler.

She closed the laptop.

**. .**

"So Brian's nice."

"Yes, he is." She accepted the cup of coffee from her. Elizabeth positioned herself cross-legged on the sofa, turned towards her. The way Elizabeth said it, made her believe she meant otherwise.

They had not spoken of Cassie anymore, and Maddy didn't ask more questions. She had spent the day inside the apartment, when she'd gotten tired of reading the small impossible text of local meetings in a small town in England that she was sure would help her of nothing, she had gone through all of this world's Mads' drawers, her closet, gone through every single book to try to piece together what kind of person this Maddy was.

But material things told little of a person.

So for now, she let Elizabeth play the game, the game where she, even Maddy, pretended they were friends.

"He's very very nice, considering the circumstances, isn't he?" Elizabeth inquired further. She was much friendlier than she'd been in the morning, the coffee a sign of making-up.

Maddy raised her eyebrows. "Circumstances?"

"Well, remember when I dated Will who turned out to be kind of into guys halfway through our relationship? Exes are mostly jerks. Maybe he still likes you despite the whole 'I'm actually in love with someone else' thing he threw right back at you."

"Someone else?"

"That single mom from his work, you know…" She trailed off. "You don't know."

Maddy circled a finger around the hot cup, looking down at the swirling milk. "Elizabeth."

"Yeah?"

"How are we friends?"

"Honey, I ask myself that every day," she joked. "Do you mean how we met, or – you, you should remember that. That isn't. You can't have forgotten that? Even though I remember reading somewhere about a guy who forgot even his wife. I mean, that must've been tough –"

"Tell me," Maddy interrupted before she could ramble off.

Elizabeth inhaled deeply, preparing. "You should know this," she whispered before she began telling the story.

"Mads" had run away from home, Maddy was not surprised at that. She had met Elizabeth, who had just thrown her "supposed to be fiancé, the bastard" out. Elizabeth, having the kind and gentle heart she had, couldn't stand the sight of someone so young and fragile like Mads just living out there on the street so she'd taken her in. There had been a lot of explaining to do when Maddy's foster parents found her again, as the police somehow refused to believe she had given Mads room without asking for anything in return.

"If they just could've seen how you looked when you showed up, it made, I didn't even know you but it made my heart break. You were like a kitten; nobody can resist taking care of a poor kitten can they?"

She was comparing Maddy to feline.

Mads had apparently threatened to charge her foster parents for something to the police, Mads never told her what it was for.

"What was it? What did they do? I never thought you were pretending, or else they wouldn't have listened."

Maddy couldn't answer; she didn't even know it.

And whips, Maddy and Elizabeth were sharing just this flat together with Maddy getting regular money from her foster parents every year until one of them "like died or something" but that didn't matter so much because they both had jobs and would've done just fine if the rent hadn't gotten raised during the last months and now they were struggling and really Elizabeth wished that Maddy could get back to work so they could pay, _no pressure or anything._

"Why did I come to you?" Maddy asked when Elizabeth was apparently finished.

"You didn't come to me, you just happened to be at the right place at the right time."

"But what if I hadn't been?" Maddy went on. "What if I hadn't been there, when you were there, upset because your fiancé was not your fiancé anymore, or what if he still was. Would you still have taken me in?"

"I don't think that's the most important question is it? I think the better question is 'what would you have done, Mads'?"

**. .**

"Like a walkie-talkie?" Maddy asked, she pressed the number one and saw it come up on the screen, as a computer then.

"Like a freaking cell phone."

The next day Elizabeth had taken a day off, and she was making lunch in the kitchen while Maddy was trying to figure out the strange thing. Elizabeth said that one's cell phone said a lot of a person, and she wanted to know what it said about her.

"I prefer computers," Maddy mumbled to herself, still with the small device in hand she sat down in front of the laptop and typed into the search bar: _cell phone_.

She then realized this was not a good search word, but this thing seemed to have the answers to everything. Biting her lip, she typed in: _what do you use cell phones for._

Apparently she could "receive phone calls" and "call people."

It was all very curious. She clicked on a button that she supposed would lead her to her contacts lists, were many names were listed.

_Cassie Garcia_

_Claret Thimbleberry_

_Daniel Far –_

She blinked, stared, _Claret Thimbleberry_.

Green-phone shaped button. Pressed. Screeching signal. Another screeching signal. Repeating and repeating.

"_Claret._"

Maddy blinked. "No, it's Maddy."

Silence from the other of the line, then, "_What do you want?_"

Maddy shifted in her seat, her free hand clenching and unclenching. "Um, it's… Claret Thimbleberry I'm talking to… is it not?"

"_Is this supposed to be some kind of joke? There is a thing called Caller ID, Mads._"

"Benjamin Linus," Maddy said quickly before she lost her. Did Claret know him? Was everything different for Claret too? She sounded so different, secure, a little bit annoyed in her tone and Maddy couldn't figure out if it was because she was speaking to Maddy or because that was how she was generally now.

"_What about him?_" Claret said and broke though the barrier of her thoughts. "_If this is one of your other drunken ramblings… I don't have the time to talk right now, honey." _Her words sounded softer now, so the irritation hadn't been irritation, it had been stress_. "I'm at work. You know that._ _Sober up and I'll come by your apartment this afternoon all right?_ _Or is this an emergency?_"

"Em…emergency?" she stuttered.

"_Mads, is this about your father?_"

Maddy's eyes widened. She clutched at the cell phone hard afraid it would disappear. "My… my father? Garrett? Is he all right? Where is he?"

"_Garrett who? I have to go now, sweetheart. Is Ellie there? Talk to her. And your father's in the same place as he's always been. I'll come by as soon as I can. I have to go. Bye_."

Click.

Call ended.

Maddy put the cell phone carefully down beside the laptop, breathing heavily for a few moments, pulse racing, eyes tearing up.

She dashed out of the room. Elizabeth looked up from her book.

"Who is my father?" Maddy did not allow a single tear to spill.

**. .**

"You never visit." Elizabeth glanced at her instead of the road worriedly when Maddy said she did not recognize a thing.

"It does not seem like the best place to come to," Maddy said silently.

They walked over the grass that hadn't been cut in a long time; pass the headstones and the hedges. Elizabeth knew the way. "I am here all the time," she said, leading her over gritty paths and between stone angels and silent sad eyes.

"It's somewhere here."

Maddy was no help. She read the names and the engravings and they meant nothing to her but old stories of people she would never really know.

Elizabeth took her hand, Maddy flinched but Elizabeth interlocked her fingers with hers and led her over to a small, incurious headstone.

_Jonas Sumatose _it said, date of death leading back over ten years. No engraving, no quote, no loving father. Maddy had been just a little child when he had died.

With a sharp twist to the gut, Maddy thought that this might be her real father, not just here, but in the other world where she knew no other Elizabeth but of the one who had raised her.

"We should've brought flowers," Elizabeth said rapidly. "You're supposed to bring flowers. Even though it's so depressing when the flowers rotten and die, and it's like; why should they die too… you know… um. It's tradition."

"Tradition," Maddy repeated, still staring at the name. Jonas Sumatose – her supposed father.

"You okay?" Elizabeth tugged a little at her hand.

"How did he die?"

"I… I don't know, you never told me. I just thought it was because you… but, you don't know either? I guess it's possible. You were only like, four or three or something. A kid's memory is mostly lies, I read that somewhere."

They walked back to the car in silence, but Elizabeth, as always, couldn't be silent for too long.

Maddy had just opened (with slight difficulty) the car door when Elizabeth spoke.

"How long will it last?"

Maddy looked up. Elizabeth pulled her blonde hair back from the wind.

"This confused state of yours, how long will it last? I know… I know you don't want help. But I kind of miss..." Elizabeth stopped herself, looked down before she stepped inside the car.

A song _Way More Awesome Than You_ played on the radio all the way back.

She couldn't be too mad at Elizabeth for quirking her lips at how ill-fitting it was.

Then the voice on the radio, announced that they would continue playing songs by Owen Chauncey in memorial an hour from now.

**. .**

Claret was dressed in a dark blue pantsuit. Her makeup was flawless but not over the top and her hair was tied up in a tight knot. She looked out of place, above the mess that was Maddy's room. Maddy felt like a little child, snot running down her nose with the silent tears, but Claret just pulled her into a (though stern and short) hug.

She had arrived not long after they had come back from the cemetery, and Maddy had recognized her immediately despite the whole change from the island's demeanor.

"You visited your father's grave today," Claret stated. Her voice didn't falter, didn't shiver. It almost boomed. "That's a great step."

"Great?" Maddy asked, wiping at her eyes.

"Yes. How did you feel when you did it?"

"Um… confused." She looked away, suddenly feeling embarrassed. She did not know Claret, not really. Not even the before Claret. The Claret with shaking hands and a voice that broke, and here Maddy was, crying in front of her.

Claret's sleeves rolled up slightly when she sat down as far on the edge of the bed she could. No scars, no bruises, no wounds. Maddy if possible felt even sillier. "Why did you feel confused do you think?" asked Claret.

Maddy didn't sit down; she didn't know what to think. Why was it important what she felt? "Ben," she said. "Benjamin Linus."

"Did you think of him?" Claret asked softly.

"No… I was simply inquiring…" Maddy met her eyes. "Do you know him?"

"We've spoken of him many times in our meetings," she said matter-of-factly. Maddy noticed how she kept playing with a ring on her finger – a wedding ring.

She tore her eyes away from it. "Meetings?"

"Our sessions, yes." Claret nodded.

"You're my therapist." Claret was like Harper, although Harper never made home calls. It felt like she had crashed into a wall, but there was no pain, only dullness in her mind over the revelation.

Claret blinked, but she seemed just as calm as collected as before. "Indeed I am, but I was also a friend of your father's."

Maddy began walking across the room, back and forth, feeling like she would collapse if she didn't keep moving. "How did he die? Jonas?"

"You know how –" Claret began.

"Tell me," Maddy insisted. "Again. Tell me."

Claret took a deep breath. "Losing your father in such a way –"

"Tell me."

"Your father, my friend," she said quickly, as if it would hurt less the faster it went, "Jonas, killed himself."

She didn't let the words take effect. "How?"

"With a gun, Mads –"

"Why?"

"Because he saw no other way out. You were just a little child. You –"

"I was there, wasn't I?"

Claret nodded. "You were there."

"He did it in front of me…" Maddy whispered.

"You have never spoken of it before; did the visit to the graveyard trigger a memory?"

"Why would he do such a thing in front of me?"

"He saw no other choice," she said patiently, folding her hands, as if it meant little to nothing, as if she knew all the answers and Maddy did not.

"You always have a choice to pull the trigger or not!" she screamed.

Claret froze, even more stoic in her posture than before.

"Sit down," she said, her voice was still calm, but with a slight shiver to it.

Maddy promptly sat down on the chair.

"Do you feel like he was doing an injustice to you?"

"Injustice?"

"Do you feel mad about him for leaving you? Is that how you feel, like he left you?"

Maddy looked out the window, where she could see the tree. "I… I feel like he should be here. He promised me that, when I was a little child he promised he would always be there no matter what I had done. He would never deliberately hurt me, would he? I cannot comprehend, despite everything, our arguments, the things we said to each other – the things we s_aid_. How he could ever; still, want to… want me hurt… He's my… he's my… there must be some very, very good reason for it? Couldn't… there be?"

Claret nodded slightly. "I'm scheduling a meeting for next week, is Sunday good?"

**. .**

"This Cassie woman keeps calling me, please make it stop," Maddy told Elizabeth when he came back to the apartment again.

"If you help me load off these totally disgusting but cheap groceries then definitely."

Maddy tore her eyes from her books to help her carry the things over to the counter.

"That Cassie woman, by the way," Elizabeth waved a rotten-looking tomato in her face, "is your fellow co-worker and the only reason I even dare to let you go over there. Without her you would have probably been kidnapped, twice."

Maddy nodded in agreement, not really paying attention as she went back to her books.

Elizabeth clasped her hands together when she was done. "Um, so, any particular reason for your sudden interest of the old centuries?"

"Not the old centuries, I said seventeenth century London," Maddy corrected her and went back to the book.

"So, an explanation, maybe? Or is this like that time with you and the origami? You know you still haven't paid the library back for those two books you spilled glue and orange juice on."

Maddy ignored her.

"Not that that's a hurry or anything. I mean, they're just two books, I suppose. But if I was my co-worker Josephina it would be a totally different story. Josephina thinks all books are sacred, from teenage vampire werewolf purple prose things to Sylvia Plath poems. There was this one time when this guy came back and he had accidentally buckled one of the pages and Josephina had already had a bad day, see you know the red staircase? She had…"

Maddy continued to ignore her as Elizabeth went off into another one of her stories where she always trailed off to explain why the staircase bad been painted red from blue and then pondered on why this had changed and then a theoretical scenario of the painter of the staircase's life which all derailed into a long speech about Labradors.

_Chetwood._

She blinked, leaning in to read the name again. It was a list of the nobility, barely noticeable, only in passing. It could be any family, she told herself, it could be anyone, and it also could be Elizabeth Grace Chetwood.

She had no expectations of finding any information anywhere about Garrett Speir. They hadn't told her much of their past lives, she hadn't even known they had past lives, and when she had found out she had been too angry and too distracted to listen. But Richard had told her that Garrett had been poor and Elizabeth had been rich and Maddy knew enough to realize how that had happened.

"Mads?"

She looked up, Elizabeth was very close to her, big blue eyes round and concerned as she waved with her hand in front of her face. "Were you even listening to me?" She looked a little hurt.

Maddy closed her eyes, composed herself before opening them again. "I was not." She closed the book and went to grab her coat.

There was someone she had to see.

**. .**

"Hi, what are you doing?"

Maddy turned around to see a young woman. The woman stood on the first step of the stairs leading up to the port, holding a bag tightly clutched in her hand. She looked almost a little afraid of her, almost hunched into herself. The frown on her face made her seem older than she was.

She was looking thoroughly bewildered, and Maddy understood that it was perhaps not a common occurrence for her to find a stranger screaming at a machine. But she just couldn't figure out how to get the doors to open. They were locked and there were numbers and then there were buttons to push and voices coming out from a comm. Voices that kept yelling at her and asking her to stop and refused to let her inside.

Maddy fought between the instinct to run and ignore the stranger woman, but decided in the end she needed her help. It had not been the wisest decision to tell Elizabeth she was going alone. "I'm visiting a friend but I don't know how to get in."

"You press in the code, of course, or you call him."

"I do not believe he would hear me from here," Maddy said with a sad sigh, looking up at all the windows.

The woman walked up the final stairs. "Who is is you want to visit?" she asked.

"Brian… Haligan."

The woman's face shone up and she smiled as if Maddy was an old friend. "That's my neighbor. Come in, come on in, he's probably not at home this time but it never hurts to try!"

Maddy helped her carry the bag as they went up the stairs (she looked she needed it) and the young woman was called Sarah and kept asking Maddy questions. "You remind me so much of that girlfriend of his…" Her voice trailed off and her eyes looked distant for a moment. "Except she wore so much makeup you could barely see her eyes, and she wasn't very pleasant, kept giving me these very sinister looks. I think her name was…" She pondered on it for a moment. "I think it was Madison? Madeline?"

Maddy nodded along, so this Mads was perhaps not the nicest person. But still had people like Elizabeth doing almost everything for her.

"Ah," Sarah said when they reached the floor. "Thanks." She took the bag from her, and then waited expectantly outside her door.

Maddy tilted her head.

Her hand made a little wave. "Go ahead."

"Oh."Maddy knocked on Brian's door, then noticing a doorbell, she rang it.

"I'm coming!" She heard someone shout. She heard a man's laugh, and then a woman's giggles and Maddy wondered if it was the wrong apartment. Before she could walk away and change her mind though, the door opened.

"That's what she said," the man who answered the door chuckled, before he saw who it was. His whole expression changed from goofy to serious in a second. "Oh. It's you."

Maddy didn't notice it. She didn't care that he was shirtless. She didn't care he'd barely gotten the door opened. She threw her arms around him happily. "Jim!"

She then began to cry into his shoulder.

**. .**

**Author's Notes:** Originally this chapter was over fifty pages and over 21,000 words long, but after advice from my friend Elyad I split it in half. You have no idea how much this chapter has killed me, so it's important I update before I can regret it.

This whole chapter felt like running a marathon. "I don't want to. I don't want to continue." But it had to be finished, much thanks to Elyad for being a fellow procrastinator in crime and keeping the little sanity I have intact and Lady Grey Sun for making me feel guilty but motivated and make me write lots of words to ease that pesky conscious.

Namaste.


	54. I Heard Many Things, Part 2

_I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. _I heard many things_ in hell. How, then, am I mad?_

- Edgar Allan Poe

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 44, I Heard Many Things**

**. .**

"Let's take this inside," Jim said, looking over Maddy's shoulder at Sarah, who had a hand on her door handle, but wasn't making any effort to let herself in. Instead, Sarah was watching the scene unfold in the hall.

Since Maddy hadn't moved at all but to cry deeper into Jim's shoulder, pent-up longing and doubt released, he dragged her inside and slammed the door close with his free not-stuck-in-awkward-hug arm.

"Can you please let go of me?" he asked, stumbling over a bucket (with mysterious liquid in it) over the floor.

Maddy's answer was to hold on tighter. He was here. He was alive. He was fine. Everything was going to be fine. She knew it was.

Then a voice: "Jim… what's going on?"

Maddy lifted her head. Through the blur of her tears she made out a woman with short dirty-blonde hair that'd asked the question.

"Maybe… maybe I should leave," the female voice continued. Maddy was turning her attention back to Jim, but she'd noticed the big eyes on her face.

"Maybe," Jim answered, "or _you_," he pulled away from Maddy's grip, holding her away at an arm's length, "could do just what Clarinet here said. Leave."

Maddy let go of him and he let go of her, one second she was in his arms and the next she was almost pressed up against the wall, as far away from him as possible. She blinked hard, turning to look at the woman standing there.

"A clarinet is an instrument," the woman said. She looked familiar, but for the moment any familiarity didn't matter. Maddy couldn't tear her eyes away from Jim – Jim whose eyes were as sharp as ever. Shirtless – like most times, but the crease between his brows was new and different.

The woman he called Clarinet walked past them to the door. "It's Cosette!" she yelled before she left.

"Look what you did!" Jim threw up his hands in the air, and left into the great room. Maddy thought for a moment of Cosette – recognizing the name, but Jim was far more important and she followed him.

"You're here," she said, almost out of breath.

"Obviously," said Jim, "since I do live here." He slouched down on a chair (after throwing off the newspapers and magazines covering it). "Brian's not home. He's working at the office, also known as having a life outside of you."

Maddy was about to ask him about Garrett, Liz, about Ben and the island and Flight 815 – and then, that crease, that frown on his face, was directed to her. It wasn't confusion, it was dislike.

"Jim," Maddy whispered. "What's going on?"

"Yeah…" Jim nodded, looking curiously at her for a moment, "what was with the hugging thing? Was it an attempt to murder me by choking?"

Maddy swallowed down the lump that begun to form in her throat. "What?" she managed to get out.

"You on some strong medication or something?" he asked.

"No –"

"'Cause it would explain the whole surprise hug thing."

"Jim…" Maddy attempted a smile, perhaps he was playing along, thinking this was how it was and he needed to pretend. "It's me."

"Yeah… uh," Jim stood up, walking over to her side, he put a hand to her back, "as I said Brian's not here so if you'd like you could come back later or you know, never, at all." He pushed her away to lead her to the door.

"Jim…" Maddy protested.

"Hello…?"

They both looked up at who'd entered. Brian put his red umbrella down on the floor. He shrugged off his fayed jacket. "What's going on?"

A long silence followed.

"I am going to the restroom," Maddy said in the end, as Jim kept making grimaces and looks at Brian she knew from own experience meant a number of signals only friends could share. It made her ache in a way she didn't know she could, as the only looks Jim had given her were of distaste.

She left the room, and no sooner she'd gone out of their view she heard Jim explode to Brian.

"She _hugged_ me. Hugged _me._ A non ironical hug," Jim explained. "You're right; she's gone mad after that head wound thing or whatever. Why the hell would she do that?"

Brian was silent for a moment. "She thinks you are friends," he blurted out, estranged by the whole situation. Maddy now understood his laugh after she'd asked him if he knew Jim Al. He was unwillingly caught up in his ex girlfriend's confusing life, and she now was clearly no more interested in him than she was with a dead spider, but he still wished to help her somehow.

He felt like he was obligated to helping her, as he was the one who found here crying in the alley.

"You serious?" Jim continued, sounding less and less shocked and more and more angry. "It was mutual loathing from the first moment she went 'what is Star Wars' and then decided that contractions were beneath her and that she was a pompous – what?"

"I'm going to check up on her," Brian said.

Maddy quickly pretended to just come out of the small bathroom, but Brian shook his head, knowing she had heard every words. He nodded at his room and she followed him inside.

Brian's room was neat in every way the rest of the apartment was not; empty walls, made bed and boxes to the brink with things instead of scattered. He didn't even have a closet. It looked like he had just moved in – or that he was preparing to move out.

"Jim's –" Brian began.

"We don't like each other."

He sighed. "You got that right."

"That's a common fact, isn't it?"

He laughed nervously. "Of course it is. You can't stand the bare sight of each other. You can't even be in the same room for more than a few seconds before you've started some childish sandbox argument."

Maddy didn't say anything, but placed a hand on the box. Brian flinched. Maddy closed her eyes. Her mouth was full with saliva, her throat convulsing; she was going to throw up.

"You can't have forgotten that," Brian said, almost desperately, "you can't have forgotten that." She wished he would stop speaking. "You hate each other –"

"When is she going to leave?"

It was Jim, he was right behind her, she could reach out and touch him, ask if everything was going to be okay.

She looked up at him.

The look in his eyes... this Jim didn't know her. He didn't care.

She spun on her heel and ran out the door.

Jim had the decency to look a little sheepish.

"Maddy!" Brian called out, rushing down the steps, but she'd had a head start. He threw the door open and froze when he saw her standing at the end of the steps. She was already looking like a drenched kitten in the rain.

She kept her head low, spitting out the vomit at the ground. She wiped her mouth, shaking.

She clenched her fists, trying not to cry, but tears were already welling up in her eyes. "Why did you not tell me?" she shouted.

"I would've thought you knew who he was."

"Why w-would I have asked you then?"

He threw out with his arms. "I had no idea your mind had conjured up some kind of reality where you and Jim were on a hugging basis. Sorry."

Maddy ran her hands through her wet hair. "It still exists," she said, she wasn't looking at him but at the ground where trickles rivulets of rain slid down to her shoes. "The island is still here in this world. Flight 815 still crashed. It means they're alive. It must mean they are."

"What are you talking about?" Brian yelled.

Maddy turned around and walked away.

From one of the windows in the building, Sarah was watching them. She closed the curtains, and went back to her couch. She sat down slowly, picking up the article about the plane crash that ruined her life.

**. .**

Brian was not answering his phone. He must have become like Jim, must have let the dislike be greater than the obligation.

When she'd come back to the apartment, she'd asked Elizabeth about Jim. Elizabeth had frowned, hadn't known who she was talking about until Maddy reminded her it was Brian's roommate. Elizabeth's face shone up, and she almost skipped with joy.

"Oh, that guy you hate?" she said, overcome with happiness that Maddy did remember something.

Over a microwave-dinner Elizabeth talked about the library, about Maddy going back to work the next day, but Maddy paid little attention, going over the moment she'd met Jim to the moment she left.

She almost knocked over her glass. "He flinched!"

Elizabeth stopped with the fork half-way to her mouth. "…What? I was talking about that stranger with the dog I met on the street, he was twitching though –" Elizabeth went on and on before Maddy excused herself.

She picked up an empty notebook, one of many Mads had bought but never used, and wrote. She wrote down the people she knew that she had met and the differences. Ivan, here Ivan was alive, he had still medical knowledge but what had the circumstances of not being on the island changed him? Was his sister Diane on the island or was she here too? Brian had not been on Flight 815, amongst many others that should have, and he didn't seem to have had any plans on having been on it either, working a stable job she supposed. Claret was very very different from the one she knew, with her confidence and strong words. She added that Claret had somehow known her… Mads' father.

Jim.

She picked up her cell phone, and which much difficulty of pressing in the numbers she called Claret.

"I… I have no plan anymore. I don't know what I am supposed to do."

"_Hello to you, Madd_y," Claret answered dryly. "_Do you want to explain that further? What plan?_"

"I thought everything would somehow be sorted out, if I… if I did as my plan. And now I found what I was looking for. Nothing is better; if possible, things are even worse."

"_There is no single answer to all of life's troubles and endless tragedies. You can't rely on one thing to solve it all. What do you think?_"

Maddy thought of Jim. She thought of Brian. Jim had been her friend and was now indifferent to her, Brian who had been indifferent to her and was now her friend.

She looked at the list she had made.

"I think I need a new plan," Maddy said and hung up.

**. .**

Through very thorough detective work – by actually thinking of what Brian had told her and by asking Elizabeth – Maddy had a very brief but an enough overview of when and when not Brian or Jim were at home.

Jim was apparently a little famous, writing a column in a somewhat known magazine. The column was more famous than the magazine because of the way Jim Al was not afraid to step (stomp and jump) on people's toes. He mostly worked from home, but sometimes he did have to drag himself off to the office.

Brian worked an ordinary nine to five job except for days he was taking care of ex girlfriend's who'd lost part of her memory.

"We can go to work together today!" Elizabeth had cheerfully exclaimed after her morning smoke. It was an unforeseen obstacle in Maddy's plan, as her new plan did not involve going back to that place with the man who kept asking for a pen.

Maddy had plastered on a smile, nodded, and said yes.

Elizabeth caught onto that Maddy was not going to work when she took a completely different turn in their way.

"What are you doing?" she asked, hurrying to catch up to her.

"Where can I manage to get a hold of those yellow things that take you anywhere? Like that one!" she pointed-

"It's a cab," Elizabeth said slowly. "You do know what taxis are?"

"I need one," Maddy said and waved.

Maddy realized she was not completely sure what the name of Brian's building was called, but she knew of its whereabouts and explained them to the driver. It would have gone much smoother if Elizabeth hadn't kept interrupting.

She had still not stopped talking when they reached their destination.

"Are you feeling all right?" she asked too quickly, as everything else she said it was in the highest of speeds. "Did someone slip you something? If you were doing drugs, you'd tell me right? I would never judge. I am the least judgmental person ever, pinky promise."

Elizabeth did not stop talking, but he slowed down when they went inside the apartment complex and Maddy stopped outside a door.

"What are you doing?" Elizabeth asked. "That's… isn't this Brian's place? Isn't his last name Haligan?"

Maddy bent down by the door. She stared at the lock for a moment, it was a simple one. She picked out the "Maddy, we got work. We should head back. He's not at home either."

"You say too many things," Maddy responded, lip between teeth as she concentrated, feeling the twitches, learning the crooks and the corners. She twisted the paper-clip one last time.

Nothing happened.

"We should go now," whimpered Elizabeth behind her.

Maddy didn't give up. She reached back only to grab Elizabeth's hand. She protested faintly as Maddy took of her bracelets, the one with the metal lock. It was cheap and broke easily and Maddy had a new tool.

"Mads, seriously! I'm not going to assist you in robbery!"

"I'm not going to take anything from them," she said. "And you can leave if you wish."

She could almost hear the ongoing war in Elizabeth's head, the angel on one shoulder and the devil on the other.

Elizabeth stayed.

"What're you doing?"

Maddy froze, and slowly turned around. There was no time to pretend she hadn't been trying to break up the lock. She attempted what she thought was an innocent smile, and considered clocking and run.

Brian and Jim's neighbor Sarah stood in her open door. She crossed her arms at the sight of them. "Let me rephrase: are you bloody trying to break into their apartment?"

"There is a very good reason for what you are witnessing," Maddy said.

Elizabeth whimpered. Maddy shot her a dark look.

"Wait… you are his ex, that's why I recognized you, aren't you?" Sarah laughed. "Are you gonna vandalize their place or what?"

"Actually, we were thinking more of taking what rightfully belongs to her," Elizabeth said. Maddy turned to her, surprised. Elizabeth's face was stone cold, not a single muscle flinching with the lie. "He was the kind of guy who kept the CDs and clothes, y'know."

"Tell me everything," Sarah said quickly, and before Maddy could even protest, Elizabeth was pulling her inside to have a coffee and discuss men with Sarah.

Sarah's apartment was much smaller than Briana and Jim's place, but fare neater with small paintings of Venice on the walls and postcards on the refrigerator. While Sarah made the coffee, Elizabeth conjured up a story about the dramatic breakup between Maddy and Brian, with Maddy making important inputs as whimpering every time Elizabeth elbowed her for a reaction.

Sarah and Elizabeth, Maddy realized very soon, had very much in common: they both smoked like it was their last living day and talked with faster speed velocity than light.

"I always knew he was that kind of guy who just never gets when it's over," Elizabeth agreed, "that's why I keep a good eye on 'em. I haven't trusted them since that Jim guy first tried to hit on me and then my boyfriend in the same night, and then succeeded to date and breakup with my boyfriend's sister one day later!"

They had both abandoned their coffees to smoke, and Maddy felt like she was inhaling poison.

"He must have been mad, your boyfriend."

"Jim got a black eye out of it." Sarah smiled sadly.

"Very protective."

"After a few drinks… Sean, Sean was great, no matter what, really."

Maddy frowned, looking up from the swirls of her coffee at Sarah who was still having that sad smile on her face.

"What happened?" Elizabeth asked, understanding before Maddy did the reason for the tears forming in Sarah's eyes.

"I … he wasn't like your Brian, he was actually… wonderful. We were going to get married. He was on his way back from a business trip in Sydney when… when…"

Maddy looked over to the newspaper beside her and flipped it to the other side. The headline said it all.

"I'm so sorry," Elizabeth said softly, and she sounded like she truly meant it, covering Sarah's hand with her own. "Flight 815?"

Sarah nodded and looked away, blinking hard.

After they'd finished their cigarettes, Elizabeth and Sarah were best friends, had exchanged phone numbers, already had a few inside jokes and Sarah had forced the spare key Brian had given her when they'd first moved in, and forgotten to take back when he'd realized what an eavesdropper Sarah was.

"It was almost like you had known her in another life," Maddy said when they left. Elizabeth made no reply to that statement, but her distorted face looked almost sad as it reflected in the knob. She turned the key to the door – it fit

The door opened, not silently, but with that long groan. They stepped over the endless pair of running shoes in the hallway and the empty boxes of pizza into Jim Al's bedroom.

Jim Al's room was everything everyone thought Jim Al was not. It wasn't clean to the last spot, but far cleaner than the rest of the apartment. She saw a collection of CDs (most of them classical music) on the windowpane and a large pile of books that made a nightstand. The space between his bed and wall was cramped but there was not much else in the way. The walls were empty, just the light blue wallpaper, and no paintings that he said reminded him of his mother's style. No pictures of a clueless Maddy and a smirking Jim around the mirror.

It felt like a vast empty space.

Elizabeth stood in the doorway, and her eyes flickered everywhere but always back to Maddy, she looked like she wanted to ask something, but before she could Maddy bent down to the floor.

The floor was not made of wood, but Jim kept his things under his bed, and there, between dust and between a couple layers of blankets, she found a box.

This was the same, the same hiding place.

"How did you know it was there?" Elizabeth asked, breaking a silence that was never in her presence very often.

"Because I know Jim," Maddy said. "And he's the kind of person who thinks the remnants of a fallen out page in a book have a symbolic meaning." But, she thought as she took of the lid, this Jim was not a botanist, not a fighter, he was not a person who looked at Maddy with something as love and trust. This could just as well be just a box of receipts or an empty box he forgot.

Inside the books were just pages, but they weren't pages from a box, they were cut-out newspaper articles. Some with black and white pictures, some from the same newspaper Elizabeth put on their dinner table every day.

She took out the first one. It seemed to be a local newspaper, an article that only locals would care about. _Missing_ _Felicity Hale, 26, the first female fertility doctor in Rookston was found lifeless in her car on the side of Road 33._

The next one was a wedding announcement.

_Prized Novelist marries local politician Frederic Phelps –_

One was an article.

_The police have yet commented the rumors of a red lotus being found on the victim's mouth. A source close to the family McQueen has said that her husband told him that, "Bonnie's the sweetest girl. But hell, if she didn't know when to shut up." When confronted with this quotation, Bonnie's husband denied ever having said that. "Bonnie was lovely. I can't imagine why someone would ever do that to her. She never got involved with any business – any wrong business." When later asked of the rumors of her having an affair with the actor James Ford _(famous for Confidence Man, Outlaws)_ to have any truth in it, he stepped into his car without any answer._

The next was taken out from a magazine rather than a paper. It contained two colorful pictures. Two names were large and bold in pink.

_THE PIXIE PRINCESS VS. THE DRAMA QUEEN_

_Famous singer and actress Owen Chauncey hit Japan first, then China, and then the world. Her songs were suddenly on all the top charts and you couldn't step inside a mall without hearing the the words "_way more awesome than you_" blasting. Scandals soon came out, as they always do with fresh new stars, and with Owen Chauncey's manager Sven coming out with their relationship only for them to break up a week later the scandals and rumors spread like wildfire. And with the drinking, rehabs, parties and yes, well, everyone's seen the topless picture haven't they? The break from the scene didn't come unexpected as it gave place from a new star to shine! Lorraine Hume., a girl who has shown the world you can really do what you want. Blind at the age of five the girl's had it tough but the dollars she's brought in with _Blue & Red_ sure has made life easier. It even beat the high record Owen had set on the top charts, but as now the drama queen is returning for a comeback recording to her new manager Tina, how long will it last? Will the new pixie princess everyone coos over stay strong or will she fall? In the latest poll on our website –_

She didn't read the rest.

_Kimika Yamazaki who has been on the run for five years before being imprisoned has been released by the court. This is a disaster! The legal system decided that despite her running away, shooting at a police officer, and theft, that she's innocent when her history clearly says against so. In March –_

The angry letter to the paper was written by a professor Edwards.

"_There is still hope," Taylor Smith says with a cheerful smile that tells nothing of the years she's spent in the institute. "There is no thing as irreversible. You can get better, but to get better, you need to get help. I don't blame my parents for leaving me at what my friends as kids called 'the nut house'. It helped me in more ways than you can imagine." She takes a sip of her coffee, and she grimaces slightly, it's hard to believe she is only still a teenager –_

The rest were of Flight 815, all about Flight 815, from the first notices to the long page articles, when she felt a breath on the back of her neck.

"What are you doing?" Elizabeth asked. Maddy was surprised she'd stayed so silent for so long. "Oh, dear. Is he some kind of serial-killer? Did we just break into a serial-killer's home? Is he going to skin us alive and use our teeth as necklaces? I don't even floss them!"

Maddy put everything back in the box. She was taking it with her.

When they were out on the street again, with the sun blazing over them and the box secured in Maddy's arms, she noticed that Elizabeth was silent.

She looked over her shoulder to where Elizabeth was standing behind her, a few feet away with a crease between her eyebrows.

"You should go to work now," Maddy told her, gripping the box a little bit tighter.

Elizabeth walked up to her side, and for the first time in days sunshine lit up her features, making it almost hard to look at her as she glowed.

"Screw that."

Elizabeth didn't sound too convincing.

"Go, we will see each other… later," Maddy said, and she could also plaster on a smile when eh circumstances forced her to.

Elizabeth put her hands on Maddy's shoulder; it was all she could do not to shrug them away.

"And we'll talk," she said, "you'll tell me what this is all about –"

"Yes."

"We'll sort it out, get through this thing, okay?"

"Yes."

"You are not going to work, are you?"

Maddy hesitated, shook her head.

Elizabeth breathed out, let go of her shoulders, "Don't open the box. Not until I get back."

**. .**

Maddy painted out the picture before her: It was gritty and it was difficult and she dabbled in two big areas. One: I don't care about these people. Two: I have to care about these people.

Elizabeth had left for work, tentatively and without any eagerness to, Maddy knew that things would be very different when she returned at night. She could deal with it then.

She had opened the box; of course she had opened the box. Elizabeth's words had barely registered in her brain, and she wasn't going to follow them.

She read the articles, and they made her want to scream. Made her want to stand up and scream right out into nothingness until she collapsed.

But she couldn't do that.

So her breath only hitched when she read the wedding announcement dating three years back.

She picked up the cell phone. The beeps went forward, and she waited, and she waited. She had her back to Elizabeth, but could hear her breathing, only interrupted by the signals.

_Click._

"_Hello?_"

"Claret, are you married?" Maddy asked.

Claret hesitated with her answer; she heard puffs of breath like she was going to say something but then regretted it immediately. Then, "_Mads, is everything_ –"

"Are you married?" she repeated.

There was silence on the other end of the line.

"_Yes._"

Maddy inhaled sharply. "Who are you married to?"

"_Ben_," Claret said this time fast, "_as I've been for years_…"

"Benjamin Linus?"

"_Yes, you know this, Mads_."

"I have to go."

She put the cell phone down on the table, panting like she'd run for miles.

She didn't know what drove her to it; mindlessly she walked into Elizabeth's room, glanced at the pink lamp and the pink bedcovers and the books but settles on the photographs.

More had been removed since she was there last.

She trailed her fingers along the edges that had been cut off.

Elizabeth was only human, Maddy thought, and like Brian her eyes betrayed her.

**. .**

What did you do if when you opened your eyes, the entire world had changed?

Maddy closed her own, imagining her as Elizabeth, blonde long hair, a serene expression, slim long limbs and a mind full with stories nobody wanted to hear but she always wanted to tell.

Elizabeth's world changed, and in a few seconds she knew it all. She turned around, thinking of seeing the apartment for the first time. The other room, the books she would never read, realizing somebody else lived there too.

Elizabeth eyes would then turn to her wall, and to the pictures, and realize that person was the brunette with the smiling mouth and the sad eyes she took so many pictures of.

She imagined Elizabeth, in this unknown and strange place, recognizing one thing – one thing so horrible that the first thing this Elizabeth in Wonderland decided to do was to erase this person's existence.

Elizabeth grabbed the scissors and she took a picture off the wall, cut it closely and as neatly as she could, put it back, repeated the steps again and again and again. Then she went into Maddy's room, leaving the picture of her and Maddy there, and then…

Where did she put all the leftover pieces? Did she keep them?

"Mads?"

She turned around. Elizabeth was taking off her shoes, while still attempting to make her way over to Maddy. With her shoes in hand, she looked around her own room.

"Um, what are you doing?"

"I was looking for answers."

Elizabeth's eyes flickered. "Sure you were, Sweet Pea."

There was a moment of silence as Elizabeth circled around her, clearly wanting her to leave the room, but Maddy was unmovable.

"So," Elizabeth cleared her throat, "What's in the box?"

Maddy stared blankly.

"…Right."

**. .**

"Maddy." Elizabeth looked up from the letter she was reading, it was the one Professor Edwards had written to a newspaper about the release of a convicted murderer (Kimika Yamazaki). Elizabeth didn't seem shaken at all by the gruesome details, simply leaned back in her chair. "Even though these articles are old, they look new, very new. Like someone just found – what are you doing?"

Maddy was staring at Elizabeth. She hadn't realized it would be seen as odd now, she often stared.

"Should I even bother to ask what face that was?" Elizabeth glanced at her, but turned her attention quickly back to her piles.

Maddy didn't look away, Elizabeth was organizing everything into piles, she was also organizing, working out, in her mind sorting out everything Elizabeth was doing, her manners, trying to figure out how someone who looked like a stranger still felt familiar.

When Maddy didn't answer, Elizabeth sighed, picking the article of Lorraine Hume and Owen Chauncey up. "These are new."

"No they're not," Maddy corrected her. "Some of these are from years ago –"

"No, yes, you're right, what I mean is that this guy printed some of these out barely a week ago. Must've decided to in like, two days to gather these random unconnected scribbles."

"That… is an interesting observation." Maddy's way of saying it clearly showed that she could care less of when Brian had begun to collect these things.

Elizabeth shrugged. "Just thought I should tell you."

They went back to their silence, Maddy staring, Elizabeth ignoring her staring, so Maddy pretended to look away, just for a moment.

And Elizabeth slipped something into the pocket of her skirt.

Maddy grabbed her hand. "What was that?"

"What?"

"You just put something –"

"It was that picture of Claret and Ben," she said fast. "I thought they looked cute –"

With her other hand, Maddy took out the picture Elizabeth had taken. It was not of Claret and Ben.

It was of Liz.

She tore her eyes away from the picture to look at Elizabeth. (The Elizabeth – Liz – in the picture, was sitting, hands folded, eyes looking away into them distance, there was a road going into the horizon behind her. She couldn't decide whether Liz looked sad or hopeful.)

"Why would you take this?" Maddy asked, her throat was choked up, a knot in her stomach, but she didn't let it waver her.

"Why would I sit here and help you look though articles and pictures of people we shouldn't know, and people we do know, that we just took from your ex's house while you are acting like something in the beginnings of _American Psycho_?" She spoke hurried, but her gaze never left Maddy's. Not angry, but frustrated she spit out the next words, "I'm playing along, I'm playing along in this weird messed up insignificant game you've made up and _so what_ I just took a picture of some stranger. Why do you even care?"

Maddy took a deep breath. "You are lying –"

"Only because you refuse to answer any questions. It is not that hard, you know. To trust someone only for a few seconds. I'm here now. I'm listening. I've dropped everything in my life for you to now answer some questions. Can you do that? Can you do that, if not for me, for the sanity and for some sense?"

"If I answer some of your questions…" Maddy hesitated, looking down at the picture of Liz, she felt a weird tug at her heart – it was so long since she had last seen her, and the last picture of Liz etched inside her mind had been of her leaving, which hadn't been pleasant for anyone, "will you answer some of mine?"

"If we're both equivalent in our answers, I don't see an issue." Elizabeth's smile was all syrup, sickly sweet, and not in the usual way she flung about, innocence in every word but still with secure steps of an experienced woman. This was wrong.

Maddy put away the box, but kept the picture of Liz.

"I think I should go first," said Elizabeth.

"This feels like a game."

"Then it should feel right at home for you, shouldn't it?" Elizabeth smirked. It didn't suit her – it didn't fit the image of the woman Maddy had (befriended?) got to know.

She leaned forward. "Do you remember me? Truly, really, remember me? Do you remember showing up at my doorstep for the first time? Do you remember crying into my arms? Do you remember sharing lazy days watching marathons of bad reality shows on TV? Do you remember any of those things? Or do you only pretend to?"

"I don't remember you," Maddy answered honestly, "I'm sorry for that, but I don't."

"Oh," Elizabeth breathed out. "Oh, that's… well. Good, I suppose."

"Why did you take the picture of Liz?"

Elizabeth's gaze didn't waver, although she winced – not very noticeable, but Maddy was awaiting it.

She swallowed. "I didn't think it was very wise… to let you see it."

"Why?"

"Only one question at a time, Mads, and you didn't say why you didn't remember me either. Now, my turn." Elizabeth thought of what to ask for a moment. "How did you know where to find this box of worthless information?"

"Brian looked worried, like he didn't want me to find it, eyes say a lot. I knew then he was hiding something. And now to you, Elizabeth Allens, why is it a good thing I don't remember anything?"

"Ah, well, you see." Elizabeth tapped the table with a finger. "It makes things easier."

"Easier?"

"Easier," Elizabeth repeated.

"I do not like to play this game," Maddy stated.

"Neither do I." But she still looked like she was enjoying it, the small smirk still on her lips.

"I think you should instead tell me."

"Tell you what?" Elizabeth asked.

"Who is it you cut out of those pictures?"

"I'm sorry?"

"The pictures, in your bedroom, you have cut someone out. Carefully, yes, but still as if it was done in a hurry you tried to erase evidence of one person in your life. Who was that?"

"I have absolutely no idea what you're talking about."

"I thought you didn't wish to play more games," Maddy retorted, she tried to replicate the all-knowing smirk on Elizabeth's face on her own, but felt like she was failing, like Elizabeth was seeing right through her now and had done so all along.

Elizabeth breathed out slowly; Maddy could see her fingers twitching after a cigarette. "We have a balcony," she said.

"No we don't," Maddy replied instantly.

The smirk fell from Elizabeth's face when she stood up. "Come on, I'll show you."

She walked back into her room. Her eyes flickered nervously once again over all the pictures on the wall, maybe she wished she had removed them all. She opened the window and climbed over the pane.

"What are you doing?" Maddy shouted.

"Jumping," Elizabeth said, throwing her other leg over the side, dangling them as she sat. With a smile she looked at Maddy, before she let go.

Maddy ran to the window, clutching at the air like she could catch Elizabeth. She heard her laugh and looked down. Elizabeth was struggling to her feet, standing on the balcony below them, belonging to the apartment underneath theirs.

"It's been empty for ages; no one wants to move in that hole. We used to do this all the time." She smiled. The distance was ridiculous, barely even there. "Come on down here."

It was a thing Jim would tell her to do. It was a thing Garrett would nag at her not to do. It was a thing Liz would say strengthened her character – or made her utterly ridiculous.

Elizabeth was expecting noting else than for Maddy top jump down beside her.

"Isn't there an easier way?" Maddy asked.

Elizabeth nodded. "Yes, through the door."

Maddy took the leap.

It wasn't far, she could easily climb up again, but she was still panting when she landed, staggering as Elizabeth helped her sit down in one of the useless rickety plastic chairs. There was a pile of plastic next to it, and she assumed that had been the second chair's fate. She wondered if it had been her and Elizabeth, laughing, smoking and drinking, that'd ruined it.

"Are we still playing the game?" Maddy asked. She tucked her hair behind her ears, the wind was blowing steadily but the air was still warm.

Elizabeth shrugged. She looked very tall, looking over at the people on the street. "If you got any more questions."

"Why is it easier?"

"Life in general? In many ways it's harder."

Maddy stood up, walking over to her, leaning forward just like she did and looked. Colors passed by – blue, yellow, orange, silver, darker silver, black and white – cars. People walked by in many more colors, scents, alone and together.

Elizabeth's cell phone rang, she picked it up, pressed one of the many buttons and it stopped.

"Who is it?" Maddy asked, knowing very well Elizabeth knew what she was talking about.

"I could fool you so easily," Elizabeth mumbled softly, "I could pretend and act and I can."

"Who is it?"

"Someone who we should rather forget," Elizabeth said.

"That is vague, that is horribly vague and I –"

"His name is Simon."

Maddy shook her head. "Is that all I'm going to get?"

Elizabeth shook her head too, in defiance. "You don't remember, what do you remember, Mads?"

"I remember…" Her voice trailed off, because she couldn't explain it, the beaches, the trees, getting lost and found again, Garrett's awkward hugs and Liz saying goodnight, Jim's laughs and the feeling of a bullet piercing your body, Ellie's hand in hers, the constant fear. She opened her mouth to say something, to explain in some way all of this, but was interrupted by Elizabeth's voice.

"Do you want me to tell you a story?"

Maddy wanted the truth, but with the slight wind blowing around them, and the muffled voices, and the sky that was turning gray, everything around them seemed blurry, far away, unimportant at the moment, so she said yes.

"When I was a little girl, I always used to play in the sandbox. I lived in this suburban all red houses and white picket fences, and in the middle of it all was the park, there the nannies or occasional parent took their kids to play, you know all ordinary. And the kids all had their favorites, the swings, the toys, but I was obsessed with the sandbox.

"I loved it when it had been raining, because then the sand was easier to build with, and I would always build, again and again and again the same thing every day. It would always get ruined by the end of the day by someone's boots or the wind. The world I built was always gone when the night came, and always rebuilt in the day.

"Then one day, one morning I went over there to the same sandbox, and the world I'd built was still there. I stared, I was a frozen statue and then I was a tornado. Stomping, clawing, at myself and everything around me until all that was left was dust."

Elizabeth finished the story by turning to look at Maddy. "You can figure out the point of the story yourself."

**. .**

They climbed back in, the sky was black, but the city was full of light even in nighttime. Maddy didn't watch it, thinking like most people do when going to bed, that all her problems would, if not gone, be seen in a new and fresh light.

She thought she was in her own bed, in the Barracks when she woke up. She didn't open her eyes but kept them close, reminiscing. The birds chirped. She sighed and rolled over to her back. There was an ache in her body she couldn't really remember where it was from, and then a knot in her stomach. Liz would scorn her and she would scorn Jim and –

She opened her eyes. The room was dark and she wasn't lying in her bed, in her room, not even in the house she'd took over after Karl.

She clenched her hand on the cover, wishing to tear it apart, ruin the room around her like a little kid, like Elizabeth and the sandbox.

Before she could do anything drastic, she got up, and the morning minute of awareness was over.

The apartment sounded empty. She looked around it; saw their scattered belongings, a book on the coffee table, dirty dishes in the sink, and a jacket on the floor instead of on the hook. The sun was shining.

"Elizabeth?"

There was no answer.

The light blended her. She stepped inside Elizabeth's room. There were light spots all over the walls, square spots left from the pictures she'd removed. The room was emptied. But above the bed… Maddy walked over, slowly, crawling up and over the covers.

The cut-off pieces.

The pictures were small, they were half, and they were all of the same person. His hair was blonde, ruffled in every picture as if by wind. His eyes were a clear blue. He often had a cigarette in hand. The one in the middle was of him walking, he wasn't looking at the cameras, it was blurry, like Elizabeth hadn't meant to take the picture at all. The building in the background looked familiar.

Maddy turned her eyes to the next picture, and the next, and the next. The man smiling, the man laughing, the man making a ridiculous goofy grimace while leaning against a tree, Maddy connected them to the other pictures. She had been there. She had known him, but who was he?

She felt like she knew, not like Elizabeth felt familiar, but like he had been a stranger in a crowd she'd briefly seen.

She jumped off the bed, running back to the hall. "Elizabeth? ELIZABETH!"

She saw someone move underneath a blanket on the couch. She ran over and dragged it away. Elizabeth stirred, but when she opened her eyes she didn't look groggy or sleepy at all. Elizabeth smiled instead her sweet smile, sitting up.

"Must've fallen asleep in front of the TV," she said, yawning. "What's the time?"

"Who are you?" Maddy whispered.

Elizabeth stood up, stretching out her arms as she made her way over to their cupboard. "Cereals sounds good right now."

She must have heard Maddy. "Who are you?" Maddy repeated, louder this time.

Elizabeth looked at her over her shoulder, a pitying smile now. "I'm your friend, Mads. You know that."

Do I? "I do not know that," she said honestly.

Elizabeth froze for a second, before she began to move again, putting a bowl in front of her. "You're being weird again. You know."

Maddy raised and rushed over to her, almost breathing down her neck. "What is your true name?" she asked.

She sighed, rolling her eyes. "It's Elizabeth, Elizabeth Allens."

"You are lying."

Elizabeth suddenly looked at her, scared, worried, like she wanted to escape. Maddy realized she had her standing in a corner. She quickly backed away, but she was not going to let Elizabeth walk away.

Elizabeth looked like she wanted to cry now, and then in the next second her frown had smoothened out, and she held herself with a grace that hadn't been there before. "Yes I am."

It took a moment for Maddy to realize what she was answering to, and then she couldn't even feel the least bit satisfied at that answer.

"Who are you?" she asked again.

"I'm Elizabeth Allens now," Elizabeth said, her voice changed, not sugarcoated or dripping sweet but blunt. "But I wasn't when I was born, though it is who I am now. So technically I haven't been lying to you. I just change who I am often. It's better that way if you don't want to be who you were before."

Maddy let out a long breath, almost of relief. "What is this? What is all of this?"

"This." Elizabeth looked up at the roof. "Is an apartment, ours even. Or do you mean this?" She pointed at the window and walked over to it. "This is a place where you escaped."

Maddy went over to her side, Elizabeth's entire posture was different – confident, straight back and head held high. "What does that mean?"

Elizabeth circled around her, kept touching all the things, from the side of the kitchen table to the top of the couch to the little painting of the red house, making sure they were neatly in their right place. She didn't answer her question. She seemed like a bird, flying from one thing to another in rapid speed.

"Is this all happening inside my head?" Maddy asked in a quiet voice.

Elizabeth nodded, then changing her mind she shook her head. "It is not quite that simple."

"Why?"

"Garrett Speir was holding a gun to your head," she stated just as bluntly. "Do you remember what happened next?"

Maddy tried to, but the next thing she remembered she was standing amongst waitresses, talking to a guy about a pen. "No."

"Are you sure?"

Maddy stared at her. "He… he forced me to walk… and we went to…"

"To…?"

"The forbidden area."

"Yes," Elizabeth nodded fervently, "and what happened next?"

"I… I can't… I don't remember." Maddy was the one supposed to be asking the questions. "What happened?"

Elizabeth shrugged. "I don't know. I wasn't there." She was still flinging about the room.

"You are… you are my imagination." It was the only possible solution she could come up with at the moment, but the words felt pitiful the second they left her lips.

"I am not a part of your imagination, Maddy."

"Have we met?" That something, that resemblance of someone she knew struck again when she looked into Elizabeth's eyes.

"Yes."

"Who are you really?" She felt like she had still yet gotten an answer to that question.

"Elizabeth Allens."

"What am I doing here?"

"Asking many stupid questions." She sighed. "Oh, Maddy, what should you be asking?"

Maddy took a while to think about it. "What… should I do?"

"Now that." Elizabeth smiled widely. "Is a question I like."

**. .**

Elizabeth took Maddy's hand, and acted all the way from the apartment to the park that she was still Elizabeth Allens, Maddy's roommate, Maddy's friend. She talked of her work where she'd accidentally made a three-year old cry when she'd picked up a book from the floor ("How was I supposed to know it didn't belong to the library? It's the library. There are many books in a library.") and even complained a little bit about the couple living next door.

When they arrived in the park Elizabeth pulled her down to sit down on a blue bench. Maddy looked around at the children playing in the sandbox and going down the slide, and turned to Elizabeth, confused to why they were there.

"Look, there they are," Elizabeth said, smiling and pointing.

Maddy looked over to where she had not subtly pointed out.

A little girl dashed away from her parents, running immediately to the swings. The mother took a seat on a bench shadowed by a tree, but the father was the one Maddy paid attention to.

She would always recognize the face of Jack Shephard.

"Everything is so different here," Maddy whispered.

"And too different and too imaginative than anything you would have come up with," Elizabeth said. "This may not be real for you. But this is reality now. That is Jack Shephard and that is his five-year old daughter and there is his wife, a colleague of his, Andrea Shephard. Where you were, Jack Shephard has no children, never will, and Andrea Shephard doesn't have any… yet, and certainly not with him."

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying this is quite a wonderful place. Kaylee Ann Austen is not on the run. Jim Al is on his way to getting promoted at the newspaper he's working for. Claret Thimbleberry is successful and not paranoid. Fox Edwards was made a professor, one of the youngest. Juliet Carlson is engaged with a man who will love her more than anyone ever will."

"Of course Ben Linus is still alive, even though he's of no concern to you. Lalah had disappeared off the face of the earth, leaving behind the empty shell of her wife and many other people you do not even know yet are hunted, broken and dead."

"What about Allen and… and Ellie?"

Elizabeth smiled bitterly. "What about them?"

"What is the point with all of this?"

Elizabeth leaned in closer to her, and tore her eyes away from where Jack Shephard was now soothing his daughter who had fallen off the swing. "The point is that you're here now and this is not right at all and you need to change things back to the way they were."

"W-what? I did not… I had nothing to do with this!"

"I thought I made it clear that is is all in your mind."

"Yes… but… that doesn't mean…"

"That means you are the only one who can make things right."

"Right?"

"Right is you at gunpoint, brain about to be blown to bits. Right is Dominic Austen not calling me every other second. Right is that that child not existing. This is not right. That child existing is wrong, my cell phone spammed with messages from Dominic is wrong. This is wrong in all the ways that it can be."

"And, Maddy," she said again, "you don't have much time."

Maddy picked out the picture of Liz she'd kept, and when she looked up Elizabeth was gone.

**. .**

Elizabeth walked away that day in the park.

Elizabeth didn't answer her phone.

Maddy waited, fingers trailing over the contours of the man in the picture.

Elizabeth didn't return.

**. .**

Maddy decided to go to work. The woman Cassie Garcia called her, gave her the information she needed.

Maddy looked at herself in the mirror, the white blouse and the black pants, into her own eyes. She picked up the keys and locked the door.

She melted in with the crowd, she was one of many. This was normalcy. Someone accidentally elbowed her. A whispered: "excuse me". Lights turned green, turned red, over and over again. She waited for the light, one of many, eyes fleetingly passing over the people standing in the rows, just people, nothing more. _There were always so many people._

It made her more alone than ever.

The light turned yellow. She looked up and her eyes met his. The light turned green and the crowd started. He passed her, pulled his hat down, didn't look at her. She turned around, but the crowd urged her on. The light would soon turn again.

She couldn't shout his name, she didn't know his name, but now she recognized him.

She stumbled up on the sidewalk. It was him. It was the man who asked for the pen, and it was the man in the picture. He was here.

She didn't go back to ANNA'S. She had to find Elizabeth, Elizabeth had to explain. She had to have the answers, she could not – not have them. It was impossible. Chaos.

It was morning; Elizabeth would be getting ready for work. She rushed up the stairs, feeling relieved and feeling like she wasn't running at all but floating. It was all going to be all right.

"Elizabeth!" she called out the second she was in through the door.

Elizabeth wasn't in the rooms. She wasn't on the balcony smoking a cigarette. She wasn't in Maddy's room on the computer. She wasn't by the kitchen table, copying down her favorite quotations from the book she was reading. The apartment screamed empty. Because even though all of Elizabeth's things were still there, she was not, and Maddy knew, even as she kept calling out (Elizabeth had turned into Ellie), she knew that Elizabeth Allens was gone and would not be coming back.

She stood in the middle of the floor, legs trembling with the effort it took to keep her up with all her thoughts and cries. "Please," she begged to no answer.

**. .**

Maddy saw him again the next day, and she knew he saw her too. She had actually gone to work this time, sure she would lose it, but wanted to see if Elizabeth was there, if anyone had even heard of her. She hadn't gotten any information, instead her clothes were dirty, her feet ached and her boss had scorned her.

It was the man from the photographs. He was sitting on a bench by the bus stop, and as soon as he caught sight of her he looked down and took out a pack of cigarettes.

He didn't run like the last time – whatever destination he was waiting for, it was more important.

"Hello," Maddy said.

He ignored her, picking out his lighter.

"Hello," Maddy repeated, standing right in front of him, so close the top of her shoes almost touched his.

He didn't answer. "Who are you?" she asked.

"Name's Lassie," he said, still not looking at her, "like the dog, be free to laugh."

"You're mocking me," Maddy stated.

"Love," he said seriously, "you use the word 'mocking,' of course I am."

"Sometimes it feels like nobody but me knows what is going on, but then there are people like you, and you make me doubt everything."

He looked at her, for the first time with something similar to curiosity. The sun hit his head, and his blonde hair glowed in the sun. "You hit yourself on the head?" he asked, breaking the illusion.

"Yes?" Maddy answered honestly.

He looked down, taking another drag. "Figures," he muttered. "Name's Simon, by the way, I don't usually give it out to people who may have a concussion and or have escaped from an institution."

"If you didn't recognize me, why would you even bother with this conversation?" Maddy asked, pressuring him.

He snorted. "Don't think you're special 'cause I'm speaking to you. I'll let you know I often speak with strangers. I find them to be amazing conversationalists, either too much honesty or complete charades. It's a wonderful life with 'em."

"Elizabeth Allens."

"That your name? In that case I've heard many things about you."

"I'm Madeline."

"How absolutely wonderful for you," he said.

"Why has she cut you out of all her pictures?" Maddy asked.

For the first time, other than the too fast glance, he flinched, showing her that yes, she had seen him and recognized him for a reason. He was the man who had asked her for a pen. He was the man in the cutout pictures. He was a liar.

Simon looked up, behind all the traffic the bus was driving in slowly. He took a step forward, and he turned to face her.

"Don't listen to what Ellie says, Maddy," he told her. "She thinks people are her chess pieces and the world her board. I hope you'll make a wise decision."

The bus stopped. Maddy swallowed down the protest she was going to utter. She didn't ask: "Elizabeth's gone. Where is she?" although she wanted to.

"You know how to use a cell phone I hope?"

Maddy nodded, stunned.

"I will call you, don't answer, if Ellie – call me when… I have to take this." He began to move away from her.

"Simon –" Maddy called out.

He didn't hesitate, he didn't turn around, but she rushed after him. The door was closing.

"Thank you –"

The door closed, the bus driver looked strangely at her.

She lowered her hand.

The missed call popped up on her cell's screen. She wasn't sure on how to proceed after that, meeting Simon had been all too short and all too confusing, but instead of feeling more confused she was relieved.

"_Don't listen to Ellie._"

Elizabeth, rambling bubbly Elizabeth, who also followed her with many questions but without objections, Elizabeth who had said screw it and lied in the face of Sarah, Sarah whom she had never met before.

_Sarah._

It took a lot of Maddy's will, when she had been let inside the building, not to knock on Brian and Jim's door instead of Sarah's.

Sarah opened the door with a smile, ushering her inside. "He's been agitated all week," she said before Maddy had even gotten off her shoes. "Brian, that is. He's been so upset. It's been hilarious to watch him freak out over his mail in the mornings."

Sarah still believed they were going through a bad breakup, but Maddy appreciated it. She couldn't slide into a new smile and cool mannerisms like Elizabeth had done, but now she thought maybe it was not just acting skills – Elizabeth had been comfortable in Sarah's presence.

"Actually," Maddy said, seating herself down as far away from Sarah as possible on the sofa, "I'm here to speak with you of Elizabeth."

Sarah's small smile became a large and great grin. It was a stark contrast against the tearful and red-nosed Sarah she'd last seen. "Is she ill or something? We haven't talked in a few days."

"F-few days?"

"Yeah." Sarah still grinned.

"You both are… after…?" Maddy swallowed, wishing Sarah had offered her a cup of coffee so she had something to clutch. Sarah and Elizabeth had stayed in contact? Maddy knew little of Elizabeth's past, mostly because Elizabeth seemed (Maddy wasn't sure anymore) to assume she already knew everything about her. This tidbit of information twisted her stomach in a painful way she couldn't quite understand.

"Elizabeth's great," Sarah went on, "a real support, it's hard to come by such people nowadays isn't it?" Sarah waited for Maddy to agree, when Maddy didn't, she frowned. "It everything all right? Is Elizabeth okay?"

"I don't know…" Maddy mumbled, fumbling with her hands. "I don't know whether Elizabeth is okay or not."

Sarah moved, despite the distance Maddy' put forward, closer. "Mads, you're shaking – what's happened. Is it…" Sarah paled.

"I can't find her," Maddy continued, in the same low voice. "Have you seen her?"

"Is she missing?" Sarah's eyes were large, and she was beginning to shiver to. "Have you contacted the police, is she –"

"Have you seen her?" Maddy repeated.

Sarah shook her head. "I saw her two days ago, she came by – just, just to talk."

"You saw her…" Maddy's breathing was rapid. Sarah had seen Elizabeth. "What did she say? Where did she go?"

Sarah continued to shake her head. "Is she not answering her phone? Are you sure she's not just –"

Maddy gripped Sarah's arms. "What did she say?"

"We just talked, we were just talkin –"

"_About what?_"

"About – about Sean!" Sarah spluttered. "Sean, we were talking about my fiancé, okay? She was just – let go of me!"

Maddy released her grip of her arms. Sarah's cheeks were red with anger.

"She told me she had lost someone too, and we were drinking and smoking and just having a good freakin' pathetic time." She stood up. "Now I want you to leave!"

Maddy slowly got up, looking down. "I'm sorry. I'm worried."

Sarah didn't say anything, but with a childish gesture pointed to the door.

"Do you know where she went?"

Sarah sighed. "Will you leave if I tell you I don't know?" She looked at Maddy's desperate expression and sighed once again. "I was very drunk when she left, she was kind of wasted too. Mentioned something about visiting 'him.' And before you ask – no, I don't know who _him_ is."

Maddy stayed out in the hallway, eyes staring blindly into the distance before she regained control, regained a goal.

**. .**

"Elizabeth isn't really Elizabeth," was the first thing Maddy said when she showed up on Brian's doorstep again. He blinked, surprised.

"Uh… what?"

Maddy opened her mouth to explain when someone put a hand on top of Brian's shoulder, which was quite the feat for the woman's length.

"Hi!" Claire said cheerfully, removing her hand from Brian to shake Maddy's.

"Um, Maddy, this is… uh, Claire. I told you about her…"

Maddy and Claire were still shaking hands; Claire began to look a little bit uncomfortable.

"The… the mom…" Maddy stuttered.

"What have you said about me?" Claire said in a mockingly offended tone, but she wrapped an arm around his waist and smiled up to him to show she wasn't serious; even Maddy's baffled sputters of incoherent words couldn't seem to shake the happiness from her face completely.

Maddy raised her arms – she couldn't hug Claire, because this wasn't her Claire. She hadn't seen her in so long, and intense longing filled her – but, as she reminded herself, this wasn't really her Claire at all. The smile wasn't bitter, her eyes didn't have that wistful sadness about her, and she was looking at Brian, not in the intense desperate guilty way she'd wanted to save him that night from the cell – but in a lowing, trusting way.

So she lowered her arms before they could notice. "Hi…" She managed to get out in a squeaky voice.

"Let's take this inside – okay." Brian sighed and closed the door behind her.

**. .**

"I probably should explain that –" Brian began when he and Maddy were inside his room.

"I don't believe there is much more for you to explain," Maddy concluded. It all was simple to her.

Brian's smile that had lingered after Claire disappeared. "It was a deal, actually, Mads. I tell you how we got together and you tell me why you broke into my apartment."

"I have done no –"

"Sarah's not a very good liar."

Claire and Jim's shrill laughs cut through the walls and they silenced.

Maddy spoke up first. "Why did you have all of those things? There in the box?"

Brian's eyes immediately flickered over to the missing box in his room. He swore. "Of course," he mumbled. "That's what you wanted."

"What else would I want but the truth?"

"Life," Brian said it like it was the easiest answer in the world. "Uncomplicated life."

"If you don't wish for a complicated life then why did you collect all those articled? With all of those names, Claret Thimbleberry, Kimika Yamazaki, Fox Edwards…"

"I don't really know…" His voice trailed off, and the next thing he said he said with a grimace, as if he didn't want it to be true but had thought it for a long time, "maybe because I'm crazy. Like, that day you hit your head I hit my head too and some screws got loose and now I can't perceive like I used to. Normal and freaky – no line."

"All of those people." Maddy wasn't even stunned to think of herself as crazy anymore, everyone used the word like it had no meaning. "Why just those people? What does Owen Chauncey mean to you?"

"Nothing, nothing, she isn't supposed to mean anything."

"Supposed to?"

Brian looked up into her eyes. "Who the hell are you to ask all these questions? You've basically admitted you broke into my apartment. Who the hell does that? You know, Jim was right, I shouöd've cut you out of my life a long time ago. You're the one making me like this, doubting –"

"Doubting what?" Maybe Brian was like her, maybe he knew the difference. Brian grabbed one of her shoulders and led her gently but strong to the door.

"Goodbye," he said.

"Do you know where Elizabeth is?" Maddy shouted before he could close the front door.

Brian hesitated. "What?"

"Elizabeth's missing."

"Have you checked at work? You know, this isn't my problem –"

"I can't find her. I don't know – I don't know whether she's all right or not."

Brian licked his lips, looking all of the sudden sympathetic. "Does she have any family? You could start there."

**. .**

Maddy told the driver the street name, reading it from a yellow note. She watched the city change from gray landscapes and neon colors to green grass and white picket fences.

"It's number twenty-three," Maddy told the driver helpfully when they reached Hanso Street B.

"Sweetheart," he said, "ain't no numbers on the doors. Yah gonna have to go out."

Maddy walked along the street with identical brick-red block houses. The air wasn't as fresh as the environment looked, sticking her nose with the smell of gasoline and rotting leaves.

She decided she was just going to knock on doors until she found the right one, an unease settling in her stomach at the thought, when a door was thrown open at her left.

"Madeline!"

She turned around and saw a short man smiling brightly at her. Round glasses framed his small blue eyes and he was waving her inside.

"You look lost," he said as she approached him, walking up the small front garden. It wasn't until she reached the doorstep she realized who it was.

Benjamin Linus looked almost unrecognizable, with the grin and his soft eyes and the tweed sweater.

She almost spun on her heel to escape – when she remembered that Claret and he were married, and this was her destination. She entered the hall the walls were covered in paintings of all different sizes, but it was unnaturally clean to its scruff exterior.

"You looking for Claret?" Ben said, rushing into a room on the left. Maddy followed him with caution. She hadn't said a word, until now.

"Yes."

She entered a small but blinding white kitchen. The mirror was high up on the ceiling and the small light streaming in felt more fake than real. She sat down on a sterile white chair and watched Ben scrabble around the cupboards.

He… she could barely believe it was him. Thinning hair, and that _smile_, she didn't even feel terror, or even bitterness towards him like she always did, because of everyone she'd met: Brian, Ivan, Jim – Ben was the most changed.

"She'll be home in a few," he said, referring to Claret. "Want tea? Was just making some for myself."

Maddy thought it was very curious how everyone wanted to offer her something to drink when she showed up at their homes. "I just wish to speak with Claret."

"As I said," Ben repeated, pouring a cup of steaming hot tea, "she'll be home soon. She's picking up Emily."

"Emily?" Maddy couldn't help but ask.

"Oh, yes. So how's it going? Been many weeks since you last were over." He placed a red cup of tea in front of her.

"I didn't ask –"

"You looked like you needed it. How's it going with that boyfriend of yours, Brian?"

Maddy blinked, unable to answer, Ben was trying to… he looked like he actually wished to know. She stared at his cup instead; it said _World's Best Dad _in large black letters.

"Are you…"

The door opened. Ben shot up from his chair, hearing a giggle and a man talking.

"Claret?" he asked, he excused himself and left the room, and a frozen Maddy.

"Gray!" she heard him exclaim, more giggles, a little girl's voice, and then a man's.

"I took the liberty of pickin' her up, thought I could help with that."

"Yes – Gray, uh, give her to me. It was just – Clary's supposed to pick her up and –" Ben was interrupted by the man.

"Well, then I did the job for her. Might make her like me more, of all the wives –"

"_Gray_."

"Yeah, yeah. I know. But Emily's just glad, aren't you, honey? Got to spend some time with her uncle for a change, I'm telling you, she needs toys not all those boring dull books," Gray said.

"We have guests."

Ben came back, with a little curly dark-haired girl in his arms. The little girl tugged at his hair and he let her down. She wobbled over to Maddy and immediately lifted her arms. Maddy just stared at her.

"Madd, Madd!" the little girl squealed. "'Ick me up! 'Ick me up!"

Maddy didn't do anything so the girl climbed into her lap herself, seating herself with a little smile on her round face.

In with Ben, who sat down on his chair again, came a man identical to him. Maddy thought for a moment – with the man's posture and his looks – that this was the real Ben, then she noticed the man's green eyes. This had to be Gary.

She held onto the little girl, more out of fear than anything else. Feeling anger rise inside of her for a reason she couldn't understand.

The little girl's name had to be Emily, she said it out loud and the girl squealed again, she had to keep the act up.

"Mads," Job said, nodding at her. "Ben," he said then, turning to the man looking like a twin. "I'm sorry; I just wanted to do something nice, okay? The past months have been rough – I'll call her, I'll call Claret and explain. She's probably not even gotten in her car yet."

No sooner than he finished that sentence the door opened again.

Maddy clung to the girl.

She heard the furious sound of a woman scorned, both Ben and Gray rushed back to the hall, Ben a little slower because he had to say he was "so so sorry" to Maddy and ask her to keep "Emily company for a moment, we need to sort this out – you understand, don't you?"

Emily went very silent and still when they began shouting at each other – Gray, Ben and Claret – at the same time. Gray loud but slow. Ben sounded desperate, as if he didn't wish to raise his voice but the situation forced him to (as Garrett). Claret's voice was high as a shriek.

It all calmed down in the middle of one of Gary's sentences and then –

"I was against him moving in here from the first day," Claret said. "He had no reason."

They all went silent. Steps, then a door slamming shut. Ben's annoyed voice and a sharp retort from Claret and then they turned to whisper to each other.

Emily was silent, keeping her hands close to her ears; she'd covered them when they were screaming.

Maddy thought she should say something to her, but as often, she said the wrong thing. "Emily, can you climb down now?"

Emily took a moment before she nodded and scrabbled down to the floor.

Maddy walked out the kitchen, saw Claret and Ben stand close to each other, both red in their faces from yelling and arguing quietly. Claret's hair was put up in the tight knot and her whole outfit was the opposite of Ben's. Hers strict, while his was comfortable, hers business while his was home.

"I'm leaving," Maddy declared. She had nothing to do there now. This was not Benjamin Linus; this was not even close to Claret Thimbleberry. They could not help her. "But first I need to ask you something, Claret. Where does Elizabeth's family live?"

Claret blinked. Stuttered, "She – she d-doesn't have any… they're dead."

**. .**

Maddy fled out the door, her head swirling. She could hear Emily cry out after her. She didn't look back.

She walked until the sun was lowering itself on the sky. She stopped when her legs were buckling underneath her feet. The asphalt was hot when she crumpled down on it.

She needed to go… home? She missed Garrett's hugs; she hadn't felt that in a very long time. She missed Liz's stories. She missed it all.

She dug out her phone from her pocket but Brian didn't answer his cell phone, so she called his home, waiting.

"_Jim Batman Al is speaking, please contain your excitement_."

She stuttered out nonsense first at the sound of his voice until she did contain her shock. "B-Brian?"

"_Who's this?_"

"Maddy – I, is – is Brian there? I n-need –"

"_Oh, you need_."

Maddy felt tears well up in her eyes. She could barely keep her voice straight. "I don't know where to go."

Jim sounded like he regretted his spiteful tone. "_Wait, are you all right? Is this some kind of I love you sorry for breaking your heart call to your ex?_"

"I don't know where I am."

And once again, Maddy found herself explaining the setting around her as "trash cans" and "asphalt".

A taxi pulled over by the side of the road, and Jim walked out, he looked at her miserable form for a long moment.

"You just gonna sit there?" he said.

**. .**

"You here to see Brian?" Jim asked, he sounded tired, as in tired of her.

Maddy pretended not to care, and brushed past him into the apartment. They'd sat in silence in the cab, silence all the way up the stairs until now.

He closed the door behind her and followed her to where she leaned against their table.

"I came here to see you," she said before she could regret it. Images of Elizabeth swirled in her brain, her words "wrong, wrong, wrong" pounding but she pushed those away to concentrate on what was in front of her: a Jim with a frown and unkind eyes.

She didn't need Brian to solve this; she needed her friend, her Jim. This was who she wanted to figure this all out with.

"You need to stop screwing 'round with Brian," Jim retorted before she could say anything else. "Okay? You dumped him. I had to watch _Love Actually _with him. He's finally together with his lovesick puppy crush for three years and she's actually a nice normal _okay she's a single-mom no big deal_ person."

"I am not 'screwing' with him."

"_I am not_ –" Jim repeated, taking a deep breath to calm himself, "seriously, he's been acting like crazy, all harried psycho-the-movie-ish. It's all centered around you. I'm worried about Mads. Mads. Mads. Mads. Mads."

"Stop."

"What the hell is wrong with you? Why can't you just be… normal? Why can't you just leave him the hell alone! You're always up on your high horse!"

"Jim… please stop…"

"And all this amnesia act. I watch soap operas, yes, I'll admit it but only for the hot men and women but c'mon. This is real life. And Brian just freaking devours every single lie you tell him and it's – I don't know what went wrong in your childhood or whatever that made you like this but you need to back off."

"It's true. I don't know this –"

But Jim wasn't listening; he was saying everything he had wanted to say since the day he had met her. "You're such a waste of space, and I'm left here picking up the pieces – _do not touch me!_"

Maddy had reached out a hand, which she let fall to her side.

Jim turned silent, relishing in the dim tension after the harsh words he'd said. He almost looked sheepish, avoiding Maddy's gaze.

"You should leave," he said into the silence, which was not really silence, just the stillness of a moment to process and not understand.

He finally glanced at her, and he kept the stare. Maddy didn't know how she looked but she could imagine, hold back tears, head held high despite of this, straight back of someone who had been drilled years and years for it.

She must look like Liz when she told them she was leaving again.

"I am not a mad woman. Though I don't know things, like what a laptop is, because I never learned. Brian is in no need of a protector and especially not someone like you. My name is Maddy, not Mads, not Madeline Sumatose. I came here because I thought –" her voice cracked for the first time but she went on, "because I thought you were the Jim Al I knew."

"The one you knew, what the hell –"

"I was clearly mistaken," Maddy spit out. "My best friend Jim is not a coward."

Jim opened his mouth to respond, but was cut off when Maddy's cell phone called. They stared at each other for a moment before she picked it up and answered, almost gleeful that it only took two times before she pressed the right button.

She didn't shout this time. "Hello?"

"_Mads?_" It was Brian's voice and he sounded stressed.

"Yes… it's me. Brian, what is the matter?" She saw Jim's eyes widen, she held the cell phone out of reach for him, and felt a shameful happiness when he tried to reach for it.

"_Where are you?_" The sound of shoes on asphalt could be heard.

"I'm at your place."

She heard him swear. He ended the call with a click. She blinked.

"What did he want?" Jim asked, almost bouncing on his feet. He looked anxious, the kind of anxious he used to look when he was worrying about her "Was he in trouble? Have you tied him up and left him somewhere? He's not into that. I've asked."

Maddy laughed.

He stared at her like he thought she was even madder than before.

Maddy could not stop laughing, she felt laughter bubble up in her chest, almost hysterical she leaned against the table again, feeling the tears she'd pressed down well up again.

"You… are you… what…" Jim stammered.

Maddy looked up, wanting to say "I was wrong, you're him. Please help me. I do not care you don't like me because I'll still be here no matter what" when the front door was thrown open.

She swirled around in a second and before she could realize what was happening.

Brian ran in, Jim took a step forward, blocking her from view.

A shot fired and she stumbled back, seeing the blood spread like a flower blooming – but it wasn't hers.

Jim collapsed in front of her; Maddy looked up and came face to face with someone with green eyes and freckles. She heard Brian scream, distantly, even though he was in the same room. She couldn't hear anything but her own blood rushing in her ears. The chant of: _Jim's been shot. Jim's been shot. He's dead. He's dead. No, no, no, no, no._

She looked into Jim's killers face but couldn't understand who it was. Green eyes. Freckles. Hair that always looked slightly speckled.

He raised the gun again.

She threw herself to the side, feet slipping in Jim's blood. She could not hear Brian's shouts in full force.

She grabbed one feet of the table and dragged it forward, making the man stumble into it and loose his step for just a moment. A moment that allowed her to crawl to her feet and meet him again as he pointed the gun, she grabbed his arm, harder than he expected, ducked away from the barrel and with a force that shouldn't be possible for someone her size, she pushed him hard down to the floor.

He landed beside Jim. Brian kept shouting. _Stop,_ Maddy thought. _Stop. Stop. Stop. _

The man spit out something, tried to point the gun at her head.

She felt like she was flying, when she grabbed his head and snapped it – quick to the side.

It cracked. It was a sound louder and worse than any of Brian's screams, worse than Jim's gasp when he fell.

He landed on the floor. The man did not move again.

Maddy stumbled away from him, crawled over to Jim's side. He was to the side, his face staring, dull, empty eyes. He must have died almost instantly. There was nothing that she could have done for him. This was not her Jim. Her Jim was still somewhere. The Jim that she remembered –

She buried her face between his shoulder and neck, he was still warm, and she broke. Snapped like a twig, this was like the laughing before, but now with tears. She held onto him, didn't want to let go.

Jim was dead. His eyes unmoving and she would never hear his laugh again. She would never see him smile. He would never crawl in through her window just to spend a quiet night reading together. He would never make inappropriate jokes and make her stare at him, so confused and the next hysterical with laughter.

"Please, no, please, please, please." Liz had once told her not to beg. Liz could possibly not understand what it was like.

It was Brian's voice that made her come out from the nest that was holding Jim and not caring, not caring of the blood smeared on her cheek.

"You just killed him!" And between everything, between Jim lying there, she still holding a hand around his sleeve, after him being murdered, Brian cared that she had snapped neck of the man who had tried to kill her too. "Who the hell – what –"

"Who…" Maddy sat up on her knees, wiped away the tears the best she could. This is not the Jim who swirled you around. "That man," she said, "is called Dominic Austen." She turned around to take the gun out from his death-cold hand. She didn't look into Dominic Austen's also lifeless eyes. "He is wrong."

"Police, police, need to call the… god…" Brian said, looking around for a phone.

"You cannot call the police."

"Wanna bet? He just freaking shot – he tried to kill you!" Brain screamed through his tears.

"Do not call the police."

"I don't care if you're scared they'll charge you for killing him," Brian said too-fast, too-scared.

"You were the one to let him in!" Maddy screamed back, standing up with the gun in her hand.

"He pointed that weapon at me and said – he said he had to find you."

"He wanted to kill me. You led him to me," Maddy whispered. The bullet had been meant for her. If Jim hadn't taken that step –

"Well… well… he didn't. Did he? Where is the freaking phone!"

Brian froze when Maddy cocked the gun.

He stared at her, wide-eyes, backing a step. "Mads… what are you doing?"

"You are not calling the police."

"Okay, uh, okay, I'm not. Just… just put that thing away."

"No."

"Then…"

"We are leaving." She took a step forward, he a step back, and so they existed the apartment, leaving behind two bodies lying beside each other. One with eyes open, the other with eyes forever closed.

**. .**

Jim was dead.

Repeating over and over again did not make it easier, but if she could just accept the fact, it would be much easier to not feel guilt when she pointed the gun at the scared cab driver.

When the cab driver had run away, she turned to Brian. He'd swung out with his arm to punch her or the gun she wasn't sure. His aim was horrible and she made him cry out with pain when she forced him to his knees.

"Do not attempt this again. I will not hesitate to shoot you. You mean less than nothing to me, Brian Haligan."

He sat down in the driver's seat without any more arguments and started the car. She made him drive until she was sure they were enough far away, and then made him pull over. She needed to think of what to do – her next move.

Elizabeth had said this was all in her mind.

Still pointing the gun at his head, she turned to him. "Where are Elizabeth Grace Chetwood and Garret Speir?"

"Who?" Brain kept looking at the gun.

"Elizabeth –"

"Like you roommate?"

"I have a gun," Maddy reminded him, in case he did not understand what he was looking at. "Where are they?"

"I have no idea who you're talking about."

"Garret Speir –"

"I don't know! I don't know. Hell." Brian buried his face in his hands, but he wasn't sobbing.

"You know who they are."

"I don't. Madeline, what are you doing –"

"_My name is Maddy_."

He looked up at her. "Maddy…"

"Yes."

He blinked furiously. "Nothing, I just… nothing. Let me go. I don't know who they are."

"Yes you do," Maddy said, "and I'm not letting you go until you remember."

"Who the hell are they?"

Maddy blinked. "Drive," she said.

**. . **

The man behind the counter at Red Motel looked at them weirdly though his thick glasses; he nodded his bearded cheek slightly as if accepting the situation and assigned them a room. All while Maddy smiled amiably while pointing her gun at Brian, hidden by the coat.

They couldn't go back to Brian's apartment, now with what had happened, and Sarah had probably already alerted the police, and they couldn't go back to her and Elizabeth's apartment. Mostly because she couldn't stand it anymore, but also because Dominic had said he had to find her.

She wondered why.

Brian was sitting on the edge of the bed, his right shoe was still on, and he kept twisting the shoelaces, staring at the wall, as if he mid-point had forgotten completely what he was doing and had just wandered off in his thoughts.

"How did it happen?" she asked.

She wasn't holding up the gun, but she was still holding it in her hand. She was looking into the mirror, cracked around the edges. The whole room smelled of musk and the curtains were thin, blinding lights from the cars driving by and the sound all too loud.

"W-what?" said Brian.

Maddy turned around to look at him. "Dominic Austen."

Brian looked down. "He was… he showed up from nowhere. He said he had to find you. He rambled, but I can't remember about what. I was too focused on the whole… weapon…" He glanced at her gun. "I said I'd call you, to find out where you were and I did and I swear, I swear I had no idea what he was going to do."

Maddy doubted that, the gun must have given him a clue, but Brian looked desperate and frightened, and this Brian was not the same as the other one. He was not the one who spoke up when he was not supposed to, the one who got beaten for it and still fought back.

"Have you ever seen him before?"

"You know who it was…were, don't you?" he asked at the same time.

"His name was Dominic Austen," Maddy said, "and he was… he was wrong."

"Wrong? What do you mean wrong? Apart from obvious reasons…"

Maddy swallowed. "Garret Speir –"

But she couldn't finish the sentence. "What the hell are you involved in?" Brian asked.

"What do you mean involved in?"

He lifted his head, let go of his shoelaces. "You freak-out at your job, run away from a hospital, treat all your friends like you don't even know them or all too well. You look different. You are different. And then some guy shows up and he… and he…" His voice trailed off, he'd begun to cry again. "Let me go," he whispered.

"I am not responsible for what that man did," Maddy said sternly.

"You know what, Maddy? I think you're the whole freaking reason for all of this."

Maddy didn't answer; Elizabeth had almost said the same thing.

"You still do not recognize Elizabeth and Garrett –"

"I don't, I don't." Brian closed his eyes.

"Perhaps tomorrow," she said, because she didn't know what else to say, or what else to do, and she begun to feel tired, her bones weak. "We should sleep."

"What stops me from escaping when you're sleeping?" Brian asked.

"You cannot go back. You are missing and Jim is dead and the murder weapon is missing. We are the perfect suspects."

The truth dawned upon Brian, and when Maddy came back to the room after having washed up in the bathroom, he was still there.

"I'm not sleeping," he told her. "You can take the bed."

"Why not?" Maddy asked, expecting an answer such as 'Jim.'

"I don't have my sleeping pills with me," Brian responded. "I need them. I just got them. They're supposed to help."

"Help with what?"

Brian didn't answer and turned on the TV.

Maddy laid down on top of the covers, clothes and shoes still on, gun on the nightstand, but she wasn't even trying to sleep, she watched Brian stare at the TV screen.

She had just begun to doze off, when she heard Brian make a yelp. She opened her eyes and looked at the TV where a very familiar face was displayed.

"The victim has been identified as Florence Bluth," the journalist said. It was a headshot of her. Florence looked pale on the picture, a little frightened. "A mother in her twenties who was shot on the way from her hotel. The police have yet to release more details of the murder, other than that nothing was stolen from her. Any tips will be called in to –"

Brian turned the TV off.

He was breathing heavily, and he turned to her, and she knew it was not only her to recognized Florence Bluth's face.

"You first," Maddy said, not needing another explanation.

"She's dead!" Brian exclaimed the obvious. "She is… God."

"How do you know her?" Maddy asked, sitting up.

"I… I don't. I – she – it's mad."

"Madder than what we have been through?"

"I see her in my dreams."

Even Maddy raised her eyebrows at that.

"I'm on the water, or the raft, it kind of blends into each other. Flor is there, the raft she is on is burning, or it is the water, everything glimmers, and she's speaking, I never remember what she says, everything is so blurry, slipping out of my grasp, and then when everything is clear she – she is set on fire."

"Flor…"

"What?" Brian looked up.

"You said Flor."

"Florence Bluth, I meant Florence Bluth."

She moved closer to him, leaving her gun behind. "Why are you just shocked?"

Brian frowned. "What do you mean?"

"Most people would cry, tear their hair out when their best friend, when even someone they care about is killed before their eyes, but you are just shocked because you are not used to having danger so closed to you. Not because Jim is dead."

Brian leaned in closer. "Do not tell me how I'm supposed to feel."

She stared right into his eyes. "You are scared because you are not feeling the right things. You do not feel love for him. You only have memories, but no feelings, isn't that so, Brian?"

"You're crazy."

"I am not crazy. I know. I know that… when did you first have that dream?"

Brian blinked. "What?"

"Tell me."

"It was… it was…"

"Was it the same day I began to be different?"

His silence was answer enough.

"The reason you are not mourning Jim's death is because he's not supposed to matter to you, he is supposed to be your enemy."

"Enemy?"

"This world is wrong, Brian. You may believe I am mad. But I am not. I must set things right again."

She jumped off the bed, a little less gracefully than she had expected and went to get the gun. This was why you kept your shoes on.

"What're you doing?" Brian asked.

"We have to find Elizabeth." She checked the bullets again. "Always check to see what your resources are, whether it be a twig or battalion."

Brian waved at the large windows. "It's the middle of the night."

"You did not want to sleep."

Brian sighed and looked up at the roof. "You know what? I think now I have to."

**. .**

Maddy woke up well before Brian did, not letting herself rest even with closed eyes. It was still dark outside. She sat down at the edge of the bed, watching him sleep for a moment – eyes fluttering, and light breathing but with a frown on his face like he was still worrying even in his dreams.

She closed the door to the bathroom and steadied herself with a hand on the stained sink. She chose the contact on the list and waited, waited as the signals rang one after one.

Ringing and ringing and ringing.

"_Hi, it's Ellie!_"

"Elizabeth, I need –"

"_I'm not here right now, 'cause something interesting might be happening. Leave a message after the beep and I'll call you back. You know who didn't call me back? He was a total_ –" _BEEP._

Maddy was silent for a moment before realizing the message was being recorded. "Elizabeth," she began again. "Florence Bluth is dead, so are Jim Al and Dominic Austen. You need to… you need to explain to me what is going on. Brian is with me. I don't know… I don't know what I'm supposed to do anymore. The answer feels so simple, but I cannot figure out what it is. Elizabeth –"

There was another beep; the message had been cut off. She lowered her hands down on the sides of the sink and looked at her hanging eyes, the dark spots under them and the reddening bruises on her skin. The mirror reflected what she already knew, she had seen too much slept too little and fought for something she didn't know.

Brian sat at the edge of the bed, and the first hints of a raising sun could be seen through the thin curtains. He turned his head to the side when she entered the room, but didn't look at her, staring at the black TV screen.

"How are you feeling?" Maddy whispered.

"Guilty," he retorted. "How do you feel?"

Maddy blinked and looked down at the floor. "Very much alone."

**. .**

They left the motel room together in silence, it wasn't until they were out on the parking lot, Maddy with a gun hidden under her shirt and Brian with his shoes he'd finally decided to tie, they spoke.

"You may leave if you wish," Maddy said, looking at anything but Brian. "I am sorry for bringing you here. I thought you had the answers, when you didn't. As I said before, I am alone in this. It is not fair to pretend I'm not."

Brian made no move to depart from her side, and she turned to look at him.

He shrugged as an answer. "Where else can I go? Jim's dead. Creepy dream-girl's dead. Police probably think I had something to do with it, me being gone, murder weapon amiss." He added after a moment of thought. "And where are you supposed to go?"

"I think I need to find Elizabeth." Maddy climbed inside the car.

"You have any idea where she is?" Brian asked and climbed into the other seat, the driver's seat, Maddy didn't even need tom point a gun at his head this time.

"I will start looking for her amongst… our supposed common friends."

"How many do you know?"

"I know Cassie."

"Oh." Brian shifted uncomfortably; he had yet to turn the key.

"Is there something wrong… with her?"

"It's just…" Brian pursed his lips. "She uh, she hit me."

Maddy raised her eyebrows. "She hit you?"

"I might have made a comment about… Lorraine Hume's death and how it was no surprise with young stars ending up that way. I didn't know they were friends. She was a celebrity!"

"Why do you remember and I don't?" Maddy whispered to herself.

"You don't want to see her?"

Brian looked into her eyes. "I have memories of her but I don't really feel anything, at all, not like… you, and Jim, I… it wasn't completely unfamiliar. And with Claire – damn, Claire. She must be freaking out. I have to –"

"You can't."

"You said I could leave."

Maddy swallowed, resigning. "Where does she live? I will meet you there."

Brian said he would get rid of the car after getting to Claire's. He gave her the address tentatively; Maddy snatched it from him and said in angry low words that she could do things by herself.

Now.

At least.

**. .**

Cassie Garcia lived in a single-room apartment. Dishes were filling up the sink, and the ones that didn't fit covered every single flat space, dirty laundry made her bed, but Cassie herself looked clean, and just a little bit tired as always.

But the bitterness in her voice, it was there.

"What're you doing here?" she asked when she'd let Maddy in.

"I was just wondering…" Maddy tore her eyes away from the orange stains on the wall above the oven. "Have you heard from Elizabeth?"

Cassie shook her head slowly. "No… why would I? You live with her."

"She hasn't… I don't know where she is."

Cassie frowned. "You mean she hasn't been home? Is she answering your calls?"

"No, she is not."

"I'm sorry, Mads, but I haven't seen or heard from her, and oh, you're also fired from work. Did you know that?" she added.

"Oh… okay." Maddy turned to leave, but with a hand on the doorknob she hesitated. She looked at Cassie; she didn't look similar to Ellie in any way, despite their eyes and hair. Cassie had some air of innocence that Elizabeth only pretended to have.

"Lorraine, Lorraine Hume."

Cassie's head snapped up, like she had been half-asleep and had just heard her wakening call.

"Why?"

"What do you mean why?" Cassie's voice sounded choked up.

"Why do you care so much about it?"

"She's my best friend –"

"No." Maddy shook her head. "She had a brother. She had family. Who are you?"

Cassie walked right up into her space, leaning forward. "Just because we aren't related doesn't mean we're not family!" she spat. "I have earned the right to be that to her. I've been there when no one else has. I have always been there. That matters."

Cassie had tears in her eyes, and Maddy turned away, unable to look at them.

"Is there any place you know she liked to go?" Maddy asked her in a tight voice.

"Go," Cassie said.

"I –"

"Go."

Maddy left.

**. .**

Claire lived in a brick house, of course there were also identical replicas of it wall to wall, and the houses didn't look bigger than her own apartment from the outside, but it was still a change from before. The little grass covered way up to the door reminded herself so much of the way to her, Garrett and Liz's house. She tried to think of something else, which wasn't hard as there was too much going on around her.

Her fist hadn't even touched the door before it opened.

"Brian," she said. "Cassie did not know –"

"Get in," Brian snapped, when she didn't move, he dragged her in by her arm and threw the door closed.

"What's going on?"

"Claire's… still getting over the news that my roommate's dead."

"Does she know –?"

"No. She doesn't know about that Austen guy or anything else. I told her you were coming over here… uh, as moral support."

"You do not look very upset."

"I think she's more upset than me. Not only over Jim, but…" He waved at her.

"What? Me?"

"Well, you're my ex."

"Are your love problems an issue at this moment? Claire does not care. She is my friend."

"What? You've met her twice."

"Brian?" she heard someone shout with an Australian accent.

Maddy had met the Claire here briefly, too shocked to barely make sense of it, but now her voice reminded her of seeing her for the first time, she'd looked so fragile, her hair cut down to her shoulders and her whole body screaming out to hold a child that wasn't there, and then she'd punched Garrett.

She smiled at the memory.

Claire was in her living room, sitting on an old rocking chair that looked very out of place against the other bright, white (although a little scruffy-looking) furniture in the room. "He woke up," she sniffed, holding a small baby in her arms. She looked up and saw Maddy, eyes narrowing.

"Hello," she greeted them.

"Aaron," Maddy said.

"Excuse me?"

Maddy walked forward, looking at the little child she'd fought hard to make Claire reunite with. "He's very beautiful."

Claire shone up. "'Course he is."

"Of course," Maddy repeated. She grazed Brian's arm and he turned to her. She nodded at the hallway and he followed her.

"You should stay," she whispered.

"Mads – Maddy, too much has happened for me to just stay. Everything's different. You were right. Everything's wrong."

"Are your feelings for Claire wrong?"

Brian was silent.

"Some things followed us here, I believe."

"You don't even know where Elizabeth is," Brian said.

Maddy hesitated. "I do."

"Then we should go."

Maddy looked to where where Claire was leaning forward, trying to hear what they were saying.

"No."

"I'm coming with –"

"No, Brian. This isn't… I'm going to set things right. I am. I am alone in this. I am sorry."

"Guys, what's going on?" Claire had given up on trying to eavesdrop, and had decided to walk and ask what was happening instead.

"Goodbye, Claire," Maddy said, leaving out the door. "It was… very nice to meet you."

**. .**

"Her family's buried in the graveyard too, are they not?" Maddy asked.

"_Spot on_," Simon said and hung up.

**. .**

The church looked strangely abandoned, no cars were on the road, and even though the glass shimmered from lights, inside it seemed to stand there only for her eyes to see. By this church, her father was buried, but this was not important, it was the church Elizabeth had pointed out, it was the church she talked about, it was the church in the pictures; it was here Elizabeth's family must lay, everyone gone. This was the place.

She opened the heavy creaking doors and stepped inside. The shoes clinked against the stone floor, and her breathing seemed too loud in the vast cold space. The figure standing at the altar lit the last candle.

"You found me," Elizabeth said, and she turned around.

Maddy walked briskly across the floor towards her. "What is the point of this chase?" she asked, her voice echoing against the tall walls.

"In _Alice in Wonderland_," Elizabeth said calmly. Her eyes glimmered from the candles, her hands in the shadows. "Alice follows a white rabbit and that's how she ends up in the curious wonderland. Why did she chase the rabbit? Why didn't the rabbit just tell her where the hole was, pointed it out to her, told her to go there? It would have been so much simpler." She smiled, and answered her own question, "Because she wouldn't have done that then; she would not have gone to that world, when she was so safe in her own.

Maddy stopped at the last bench, looking at the woman who had pretended to be her friend. "Then, I am Alice, you are the rabbit, I have found you. Now?"

Elizabeth's smile grew wider. "Let's get started."

**. .**

Once Maddy had followed Jim on one of his expeditions around the island, she had been little surprised when he'd left the group, taking her with him to do a little exploring of their own. She had been more surprised, far more scared, when he'd led her to a cliff side, waves crashed violently against their feet. The cliff walls were too slippery to get a hold of, and he'd kept telling her "_it's fine, it's fine it's just a rock, c'mon_." She'd been convinced they were going to fall to their deaths, and then they managed to get to the other side, and she'd laughed with happiness. She had looked around, wondered what he was supposed to show her. The island was no different on the other side of the cliffs.

"It's not what's here that matters," he said, laughing. "It's the fact that we just laughed death in the face."

"I thought you said it was just a rock," she'd replied dryly.

He shrugged. "It's called positive thinking."

Garrett and Liz had told her similar lessons, "_It's the journey that counts_."

Jim had told her something else, something that had stuck. It was denying ones fears that counted. It was climbing across cliffs, it was saying "on the contrary" to Garrett, saying no to Liz, it was realizing it could not matter less if Ben would tie her to a pole and burn her at the stake.

Elizabeth led her down a corridor behind the church, down stairs, to a dark room where she couldn't see her feet, to a door with a sign saying CAUTION: DANGER.

She thought of Jim and the cliffs, she thought of Garrett's face the first time she had disagreed with him, she thought of Liz who wasn't here in this world, and of Ben who according to Elizabeth wasn't on the island either. She was the only one who remembered, this was why she was the one who was supposed to set things right.

But she still relied on someone else to tell her how.

"This is the lamp post," Elizabeth told her. "It was built to find the island, again. A group of scientists…" She looked to where Maddy was glowering. "But that's not important. What is important is for you to return to the island, where you should be and bring as many of the others as you can. Brian, Claire, Claret Thimbleberry and everyone you know –"

"Jim Al is dead," Maddy interrupted her.

Elizabeth sighed. "He is."

"He is also supposed to be there."

"Unfortunate death, but not especially tragic, he is not as important as you are, or Brian for example."

"Who are you to judge that?" Maddy whispered.

Elizabeth's eyes narrowed. "I have lived through many more times than you can imagine. We may look the same age, but I have seen far greater things and been though much more than you will ever do. I have earned the right to be the judge of that."

"And who is important then?" she asked. "Florence Bluth was killed. She is special, like Brian, as is Walter Lloyd, far more than her. And what about me? I am nothing in Ben's eyes –"

"This is not about who Ben thinks is worthy to be on the list!" Elizabeth shouted. "Ben is nothing. He is nothing compared to the importance of getting you, Brian and everyone else back to the island!" She breathed heavily, but leaned back, collecting herself. In a much lower voice she said, "Garrett Speir and Elizabeth Chetwood will be there, on the island. It might not be the same, but we must try to make it as close to before as we can."

Maddy shook her head, swallowing down the lump in her throat. "Who are you?"

"I am Elizabeth Allens."

"No, I do not think you understood my question. Who even are you to tell me this?"

"I've already said my part, Maddy. This is the only way it can all be right."

Maddy blinked, shaking her head again. "Jim is dead!" she yelled.

"And what was he before this? Alive?"

Maddy took a step back.

"It is better this way," Elizabeth said. "It is. Where were you before this? Held at gunpoint by the man who raised you. Isn't this a preferable option?"

Maddy didn't answer that. "Why did Dominic Austen attempt to kill me?"

"That's not relevant –"

"Why? Why did he do that? Did he murder the others? Before I snapped his neck – I saw blood on his shirt. It was there before. Answer me that."

"He killed Florence Bluth, yes."

"Why did he do that? He was not killing because of killing's sake. He was after me. Jim got in his way. Why is that?"

Elizabeth pressed her lips together, cornered. "He…"

Maddy slowly came to realization. "He remembered too, didn't he? But not like I remember… but like you, the wrongness, what is different."

"I know much more than you both –"

"Then why do you need me?"

Elizabeth didn't answer.

"Because it is because of me this is," Maddy continued, "and only I can fix it. I created this somehow."

"You are right, and as I said, to get it right again you need to get to the island. And I know how."

"What is there on the island that matters?"

"You tell me." She chuckled. "You were always so desperate to leave, weren't you? Even I know you were, and then when you are finally away from it you just can't let go, can you? Looking for those you pushed away, and they are there, they are on the island."

"You're wrong."

"I'm saying the truth, for once," she added. "They're there –"

"No." Maddy shook her head, a sad smile playing on her lips. "They are not there. Garrett Speir and Elizabeth Chetwood, yes, but not the ones who raised me, they're not there. These people don't know me. Just like when I met Jim, he recognized me, but not _me_."

"It doesn't make much of a difference."

"It does. If I would go to the island with you, Garrett would perhaps not be pointing a gun at my head, but he wouldn't know who I was at all."

"This is not about you, Maddy."

"You said before it was all about me."

Elizabeth did not answer that either. The pendulum swung back and forth, and her face split for less than a second into two parts by it.

"I think I know what I'm supposed to do now," Maddy said softly. She reached for the gun she kept hidden. "Garrett kept talking about making sacrifices, every time, all the time as reason for what he did." She raised the gun. "I let Jim go back to Ben, risking his life in the process, all because I needed to know… I needed to know that somewhere in Garrett's mind I was still the person he called a daughter, once."

"I'm just me," said Maddy.

Elizabeth looked up, she raised her hand.

Maddy forgot for a moment what it was like to be herself. She forgot the blind childhood memories, she forgot the pain when finding out the truth, she forgot the confusion she always bore within her, she let go and she forgot.

Before Elizabeth could run past the pendulum – Maddy put the gun against her own temple and pulled the trigger.

A crying little girl with a green cap flashed before her eyes. A baby's wail. The sound Jim made when he was shot. Twigs stuck into her back. Dirt hurt her eyes when she looked up at a burning sun.

The rifle turned to her.

**. .**

**Author's Notes:** I'm busy.

…procrastinating.

Namaste.


	55. Alive

**TRIGGER WARNING: detailed descriptions of panic attacks in the third paragraph, and many descriptions of OCD throughout the chapter.**

**. .**

**Do You Believe in Destiny?  
Chapter 45, Alive**

"For some reason, Flor, Ben really wants you alive." – Claret.

**. . . .**

Her steps echoed across the low walls. Branches tapped hard against the windows, rain fell down to the ground outside like rocks, and the storm raged like it wanted to rip the roof from the walls.

Claret Thimbleberry had read about military strategies – all for a goal, to end a great big war, casualties ranging from 20 to 2800, from 2800 to 45000. They were dull, so much more exciting on a big screen. She liked the documentaries, they put it all together in a neat order she could understand. She could ramble up too many dates for too many battles. She had read about bravery and foolishness; and she supposed this was a sort of it, a mix of the two, but even so she couldn't stop her arms from shivering as she held the file close to her chest.

Was she the brave one? Or was she the foolish one? Shivering, wanting to scream and cry and bang her head against the wall until she passed out – all so she wouldn't have to go through this.

Or is now the only time she can be brave? When she's shaking down to her boots, defying her instincts telling her to run. "It's from the animals," one of her therapists had told her, "the instinct to run, to escape, it's adrenaline going through your body." And Claret had wants to escape, but she hadn't been able to, a panic attack was not escaping – she couldn't do anything but cry and clutch and scream without being able to breathe.

Defying the urge to throw up, she swallowed the lump in her throat and kept to the shadows, the white dress she was wearing was dirty enough not to shine like a beacon in the storm.

She opened the door at the end of the room, revealing boxes littering the corridor, empty except from a fake security camera in the corner – there to frighten, a show, there were plenty of those... back home? A world where she would work, pay taxes, visit her therapist, take meds, work more, towards what? This?

She felt as if she was swimming underwater, everything looking surreal and blurry. She kept glancing at the fake camera in the corner of the corridor, thinking that Ben could see her there, and that he knew she wasn't on their side, and he was planning her destruction right this second.

She felt the knife in her back before the last thought crossed her mind.

Still as a statue she whispered, "I said I would help you – nobody followed me. I am _helping_ you." This was not a good time to throw up or pass out.

Janna kept the knife pointed at her chest. Claret supposed greater people could have twisted it out of Janna's hand, Claret supposed greater people had had their hearts cut out for trying.

Janna held her head high, but her eyes were hidden by her long tangled dark hair. Her clothes were torn, and dirty with... red.

Claret's breath hitched. "Flor is w-with you, thank you," she saw no sign of Flor, but questioning Janna's loyalty was not an option, "I –" She looked at the knife, so close to her throat. She swallowed. "Flor is well, thank y-you… I'm helping you."

"For your sake," said Janna. "I hope you are."

**. . . .**

Claret looked down at her empty hand; she'd given Sean the bottle of pills. She'd almost wanted to follow him back to the camp, to see all the familiar faces – but what did it account for? To be frank none of them would miss her, not with Sawyer having made it back, Lori, they would... hate her. They would, wouldn't they?

They would look at her the same way Sean had.

She almost voiced those questions aloud to José, started. "Do you think..." and gone silent, José gave her an angry look, worse than how Janna had looked at her so long ago in that corridor with the boxes, Janna hadn't hated her. Janna felt nothing for her; she'd only paid her debt. Claret hadn't asked to whom, she knew Janna was not doing this for the sake of her good will. Claret had read her file.

So Claret turned around, she walked back through a jungle she'd feared; she'd stumbled in and fallen in the first day of the crash. She'd been terrified, screaming out in it that day.

Now she ducked under branches and looked at the stones and avoided the traps like she'd been born to do it.

José met her halfway, with his stoic face and scarred eyebrow. She was sill frightened by him; she'd memorized his face of the person who'd murdered her grandmother. And know when she knew… thought she knew that wasn't true, she shouldn't still be scared of him, but she couldn't help but flinch when he spoke.

"We're going on an Exodus," he said.

"I've read the Bible," she muttered.

There was a slight hint of a smile on his face.

**. .**

"_Hello."_

_Brian turned around; he narrowed his eyes as he looked at the woman in front of him. She was holding a red umbrella over her head, and with her other hand she wiped away wet dark hair that had blown in front of her eyes._

"_Are you all right?" she asked. She took a step forward so that she could protect him from the rain too, a pointless attempt. The rain was coming from every direction. But Brian wasn't cold. He had no nerves here._

"_Brian? Coffee? Inside away from this?" She waved with a hand at the cars driving by, and the people walking on the street, at the wind and the rain smattering against the asphalt._

_Asphalt, he had forgotten the smell of it in contact with summer rain, now he could almost feel his fingertips..._

_He kept looking at her, her face wasn't a blur, but it was implacable. His eyes met hes, she frowned, and took another step closer, and then amazingly, he suddenly knew who she was._

"_Your name is Madeline," he said, water drops fell from her eyelashes as she shook her head –_

The asphalt was gone. He dragged his foot forward again, trying to keep his pace as he passed the trees, memories flickering into his mind but he didn't think of them, didn't dare to remember or he would lose his goal in sight and the body in his arms. He couldn't think of Boone's breathing (lack of) too much or he would let go of him. Heavy, he was too heavy for him. The trees were too colorless; everything was swimming, fleeting out of his eyesight until the whole world was spinning.

He stepped out into a clearing, grass almost reaching to his waist. He stopped. Boone was limp in his arms. He put him down on the ground and he fell to his knees beside him. Boone's bandage was soaked with blood.

"Where are you?" He tried to scream but it only came out in a wheeze. He kept panting, but he couldn't continue, he had to get them there.

He tried to lift Boone up in his arms again but couldn't. He stood up alone, and he looked around. "Help!" he shouted, this time stronger.

The world was imploding, slowly, gold, green and dark blue were blurry masses before his eyes, and his hands were tied, and then the world cleared enough of colors for him to stare into the woman's eyes.

"It might not work," she said.

"It worked for me," he answered.

She gave him a look that said that perhaps it didn't and then. "Everything comes with a price."

"All I care about is that he will be okay." She nodded, and then –

"Wake up. _Wake up_."

He woke up from the dream that wasn't as much as a dream as a memory, and kept blinking Boone's bloody face away to look into his… well, not clean, and still a bit bruised, but not recently injured face.

Boone looked annoyed, but he wasn't the one who had had a gun to his face, and actually wished that Claire would have said no so they would've shot him.

It wasn't a joy to wake up anymore and know you were still alive.

"Get up. It's not like they beat you," Boone said, referring to all the times he had been back when they had been stuck in those Barracks, in the cells. Brian now doubted that'd actually happened, knowing now that Boone had been on their side (not one of them, with them) and it could all have been just a ploy, not could, he reminded himself was. It was a ploy, and now he knew the truth.

Brain glanced at the guards. "Where are we going?" he asked.

"Away," Boone said.

That was really helpful, Boone. Might show me the exit later? But Brian didn't say that.

The dawn light made everything look somber, slower, as Brian packed up the tents, the shelters. They were once more leaving.

He found himself looking after a familiar blonde head amongst the people gathering their things, before he remembered that Claire was gone.

_But_, he thought bitterly when he put on the backpack, _she will soon be back_.

One of the guards (Cole? Colby) told him to get a move on.

"Is this what they call the silent treatment?" Boone asked, sounding ironic. Not sarcastic, like he used to be when he was around Shannon, ironic as in that he didn't even care. Brian still cared.

"Remind us why we're moving?" Brian asked.

"No," Boone said and walked away from him. This was not the man whose life you saved.

Brian stood there in surprise for a moment, before he noticed the glare of Colby (Carl?) in his back and picked up his pace. He didn't even notice that he was walking beside someone else until she spoke.

"He's rude," the young woman said.

He looked at her profile; sharp nose and narrow, almost black eyes, but pretty in her angular shapes. He knew who she was, Felicity Hale. She had her brown hair pulled back in a ponytail, and she was carrying even more bags than he was.

"He has his reasons," Brian answered.

She chuckled lightly. "You're defending him?"

Brian took another long look at her; she noticed and smiled, raising her eyebrows. "We're moving because Ben says so," she said in answer to the question.

"And you do everything he says."

"Don't act like you know everything about us," she said, "I'm talking to you nicely. I wouldn't do that. I don't do that… usually," she added with an afterthought.

Well, what a special snowflake he was, he thought, but decided she was right. This was his chance to get information.

"I heard about those sacrifices," he said carefully, thinking of the big turmoil there had been around Owen killing that guy, her manager, or whatever.

Something passed over Felicity's face, unease.

"You don't like them."

She shook her head. "They are old and pointless."

"But still you do them."

She looked at him; there was something serious in her eyes. She looked more human like that, more so than when she pretend-smiled at him. "It doesn't mean you have to be happy a-about it," she stuttered, looking more and more like she wanted to run from him as fast as she could.

"Then don't do them. Simple as that. You don't kill," he said. _You don't hit. You don't drink._

She took a deep breath. "The way I see it, here you kill or get killed, and as I do none of those things I'm falling into that morally gray ground. It's deep and colorless and it sucks and no one cares what you think ever."

"You could still try to stop it –"

"Do you really think I have any power here whatsoever?" Felicity interrupted.

"Then who has?" Brian asked.

She bit her lip; a strand of hair fell in front of her eyes. "Jacob."

"Felicity!" a sharp voice called out before Brian could say anything. He saw the Indian technician walk up to them in long steps.

"Shreyans," Felicity said coolly.

Shreyans gave Brian a dark look.

Brian gave him a dark look as well.

Shreyans gave Felicity a look just as dark.

She shrugged. "It's not like he's any danger."

Brian was offended, he could be very dangerous, he could defend himself! He wasn't helpless like he'd been as a kid hiding from his father. He could fight back now... When there weren't an army of Others against one, of course.

Shreyans raised his head and the bruise under his hair could be see, rumors was it that it'd been Claret's doing, that she'd knocked him out and fled, but Brian didn't think so, the Claret he knew was scared of butterflies.

"You seen Mary Jane?" Shreyans asked Felicity, shooting another suspicious look Brian's way, like he was about to attack him too.

Brian wasn't considering it, even if he was imagining it, he was smarter than that.

"I think, I think she's with Alex," said Felicity.

Shreyans looked around, preparing to leave.

"Shreyans –"

"By the way, Felicity, Richard wants to see you," he said and left.

**. .**

Alex tried, she really did. She tried not to stare too much at Mary Jane's wounds and tried not to make any comments about what'd happened. She'd let Mary Jane ramble about everything and nothing, not talked against when she told Alex all the ways she could kill Ben, she hadn't even winced when Mary Jane had a freak-out in the middle of the night and hit her, before realizing it was only Alex and nothing was burning.

Alex had to keep quiet about it, because she didn't know what her father – what Ben would do, if he found out really how unstable Mary Jane was now.

She'd always been forced to defend her and Mary Jane's friendship, ever when she was a little child and had come running in through the doors, yelling: "Daddy! Daddy! I've made a new friend!"

Richard tried to help now, but at the suggestion of sleeping pills Mary Jane had a breakdown, and so they were left with trying to act like everything was normal.

Alex looked at Mary Jane, who was walking in a steady pace with her head held high, black hair falling down on her back, and knew nothing was normal anymore.

Mary Jane suddenly slowed down, looking at something behind them. Alex stopped too, confused.

"What are you looking at?"

Mary Jane snapped out of it, shaking her head. "Nothing."

But Alex had seen her staring at the prisoner Brian.

"Hey," Alex said softly as they began trekking through the jungle again. She opened her mouth to say something more, when they were interrupted by the person Alex least wanted to see right now.

"Seth," Mary Jane said sternly.

Shreyans raised his eyebrows. "Mary Jane."

"We were talking," Alex said to him.

"Mind if I join?" Shreyans said, and Alex was reminded once again why she disliked him so much.

"No." Alex grabbed Mary Jane's arm, intent on pulling her away.

Mary Jane grabbed Alex's hand with her other arm. She bent it upwards harsh and quick. Alex cried out in pain and Mary Jane let go. Alex stumbled back holding her arm. The tears in her eyes were more from shock than from pain.

Shreyans stared at the both of them.

"I…" Mary Jane stared wide-eyed at Alex who quickly rushed off. "I'm sorry!" she called out, but Alex didn't hear.

Shreyans stared now only at her.

"It's nice to see you again," he said.

Alex looked over her shoulder at the pair. Shreyans and Mary Jane were huddled while they whispered urgently, almost right into each other's ears. Mary Jane seemed to become more indifferent with every word that passed and Shreyans more agitated. She turned away, Mary Jane hadn't talked much about what their history was, but rumors spread like wildfire.

She looked over to where Richard was walking alone, she thought of joining him when she saw Shreyans pass her quickly to get to Richard first. She stopped in shock at the sudden change. She turned around and she couldn't see Mary Jane anywhere.

"Alex."

She looked before her again and saw her father – Ben. He was supporting himself on a crutch. She began to walk again, not caring he had a hard time to keep up.

"Yeah?" she said when he didn't say anything else.

"I need to talk to you," he said.

"Then talk."

"You need to keep an eye on Mary Jane," he said.

Alex slowed down. Ben didn't like to acknowledge Mary Jane's existence.

"I always keep an eye on her," Alex said before she could stop herself.

"You do?" He faked surprise. "Where is she now?"

Alex rolled her eyes. "Why this sudden interest, Ben?"

"I'm leaving with Owen to see Jacob." He said it as if it was no different than _pass the rabbit._ "And while I'm gone and I don't want to come to see that she's made a mess."

"J-Jacob?"

Now Ben was the one walking away from her.

**. .**

"Richard."

"Give us a moment," Richard told Shreyans who looked annoyed, frowning deeply and almost like he was going to protest, but instead he nodded and left them. Richard turned to Owen who was standing with her arms crossed looking at him.

"Was there something you wanted?" he asked. "Is everything going good with your security?"

Owen glanced to where Niles was watching them. "He never speaks," she said.

Richard lifted his eyebrows. "Yes…?"

Owen decided figuring out Niles muteness was a lost cause, and he was not exactly her priority at the moment, even though his tattoos and eyes were eerie to the point of scary.

"Sayid keeps watching me," Owen whispered.

"I have told you. There is no need for you to be afraid. Sayid had sworn he will do nothing –"

"Oh, he has _sworn!_ That means he can never break it!"

"He won't. There is no need for you to feel this way."

"How do you expect me to feel safe with him around?" Owen whispered a bit too loud.

Richard look around them, many people watched them as they passed by but no one was close enough to hear. "I am not here to make you feel…" But he stopped himself, swallowing back the hurtful words. "Here," he said, and held out a gun. "Take it."

Owen looked up in his eyes, almost to ask if he was sure, but he wasn't looking into hers so she took the gun and put it in her bag.

"Thanks," she said, almost sounding apologetic.

"Don't make me regret this," he said, but there was a tone of amusement in his voice, and when she accidentally (or not so accidentally because this was Owen Chauncey), bumped into his shoulder he didn't flinch away.

**. .**

"Helping them was a bad decision. You're an idiot" was something any person would've said, but José didn't, he just gave her a long disappointed looks every time she glanced his way, and she knew, Claret knew she was an idiot. But she didn't regret helping Sean at all.

Ever since Flor she'd felt as lost as she'd been in the beginning, running through the forest, thinking she'd been saved by Ben, then unsaved, then saved, then safe then – now.

She'd once asked Ben one time, when she'd snuck away from the camp one of those million times and he had been waiting by a dying fire ("I choose a location where the smoke won't show," he'd said, putting another stick amongst the coal.) to answer her questions. Then she'd thought he was there to help her, help them all with: "Of course Fox is one of us. But you needn't worry about him." And Claret didn't. She didn't worry and she kept on and then Sayid tied her to a tree and tortured her.

Then Owen killed him, but really she did not.

But she didn't worry, she tried her hardest not to, even with what happened to Claire and Owen. Even when she was taken away and like her friends she was a prisoner without roped binding her. But it was José that made her open her eyes to what she could in fact do. Claret worried, and she did something about it now.

"You should have gone to the beach; I have the situation under control."

Well, that was curious. Claret replied, feeling more daring than usual in face of certain danger: "_Should have gone?" _she repeate_d._ "Not: you should go, as you usually say. Was that a mistake in grammar or –?"

José turned around so sudden Claret almost walked into him, but she stopped herself in the last second, hovering and the confidence was gone in a second replaced by the thick shield of insecurity as she stepped back.

"I'm not here to order you around", José said.

Claret's breath hitched, she felt her heartbeat racing, she stuttered: "Really? 'Cause that's exactly w-what I thought you were d-doing."

José mumbled something in Spanish, or Portuguese, she wasn't sure of the difference in the languages and began to walk again.

Being in José's company was worse than being alone.

**. . .**

"I am not with them," José had explained, and Claret had understood, Ben had already raised his suspicions to her – probably to scare her (effectively) – about having an infiltrator amongst them. José hadn't been there long, José was the one with a connection to her, and José didn't kill her grandmother.

Claret believed in lots of things, and amongst them were the files the Others had of all of them. José had been declared the murderer, he'd even been put into prison, but it wasn't him. He had an alibi.

Claret's hand touched Sean's file again that lay between them. "Okay," she said, trying not to flinch every time she looked at his face (it reminded her of her nightmares), "I believe you. Why did you give me my file? Why do you think… How do you know I won't tell Ben about this?"

She regretted her words as soon as she'd said them. He would kill her now. He would grab the file and slam it over her head and strangle her, or he would lock her in and set her room on fire, he would –

"Because you are not with them either," José said. "I need access to more files."

"But you got Sean's –"

"Not people. Constructions. Blueprints. They're locked in another room. I need you to help me."

Claret, warily, looked into his eyes. She couldn't tell if he was being serious or not, but she thought of her friends with hands tied and bags over their heads, she thought of Jack's eyes when he realized she'd betrayed them.

"And you'll help me."

They shook hands.

**. . . .**

Smoke soon bellowed out of the fires into the gray but darkening sky. They'd put up camp where the trees didn't grow as thick. Owen decided she was above such things as putting up tents, and after making sure the kids' supervisor this Nadina type or whatever wasn't around, she made the children Zack and Emma take care of it as she went straight to Ben's tent. It was put up next to the tables and fires. Alex was, what it looked like, cutting up a rabbit, Owen shuddered slightly at the sight of the blood dripping down her hands. _Great Scott, that girl should be in High School, pestering some poor guy or girl to take her to prom…_

Owen went into the tent despite the protests of that guy – Colby, whatever – and was face to face with Locke and Ben, both in a heated discussion.

"I won't," Ben said just as she stepped in. They both silenced, and turned to stare at her.

"Sorry for interrupting this lover's quarrel," Owen said. "But I need to talk to Ben."

"I accept your apology, Owen," Locke said, "but I'm talking to Ben right now –"

"And we were just done. I need a word with Chauncey myself," Ben said, giving Locke a blank look.

"No, we were –"

"Okay, let's look at it this way," Owen said, stepping between them. "Locke, run along, or I'll kick your ass."

Locke stared at her; Owen knew that kind of stare, mostly from people who didn't believe she could take them down. Sure, Locke was bigger than her but she got sharp nails.

"I'll speak with you later," Locke said, looking at Ben again, before walking out, escorted by a very confused-looking Colby.

Owen and Ben were left alone in the tent; Ben's face a blank page again. Owen tried to reassemble herself, but having seen Locke there, she felt like she was going to throw up.

"Owen –" Ben started.

Owen interrupted, "When are we going to see Jacob?"

"I told you, the meeting with Jacob has been postponed because Eva –"

Owen shook her head. "No, I don't think so."

Ben took a step closer to her. "Maybe you've forgotten, but I'm the leader here. I'm the one making the decisions. And I decide you're not going anywhere."

"Sayid's alive," Owen said. "I think that owes me some –"

"You are owed _nothing!_ You are nothing here, the others might look up to you as a sort of Moses, but I certainly don't. You expect everyone to follow your every turn, but this isn't a stage, Chauncey, here you have to follow my orders and you're not going –"

Owen held up a hand, and Ben silenced. She then walked out of the tent.

Ben raised an eyebrow, and shook his head in despair when Owen came back in, but not alone.

"I heard you were going to see Jacob," Locke said. Ben could see Owen's gleeful smirk behind him.

. .

Ben took a long breath. "Owen, you need to realize that Jacob… he is not a man you simply go and see." He put the tap back on the bottle. He was gathering water from the river, Locke was leaning against a tree, looking at his knife like it was the most previous thing in the world. Owen snorted at him.

"You mean he's invisible?" she asked, looking at Ben.

"No," Ben said calmly, but his expression was anything but. "I say he is not that patient with us breaking his rules." He put the water bottle in his bag, hesitating for just a moment.

"Well, Ben," Owen leaned forward just slightly, "since when have I cared about rules?"

"Owen."

Ben looked up and Owen turned around to see Alex walk towards them with long steps.

"I hear you're going to see Jacob." She glanced Ben's way. "You're going to need this."

She held out a gun to Owen.

"I already have one, sweetheart," Owen said, and out of her bag she took out the gun Richard gave her. "Nice gesture though, thanks."

Ben looked from Owen's gun to the one in Alex hand like he couldn't decide which betrayal was the worst. Alex collected herself from the surprised of Owen owning a weapon and turned to Locke. "You want one?"

Locke waved with the knife. "Thank you, Alex, but I'm all set."

Alex began to leave, but then she stopped, turning around to face Ben. "Happy birthday, Dad," she said and left back into the trees. Leaving Owen smiling with glee and Ben stunned to silence.

"We should leave now," Owen said, "if you want to keep those watchful eyes out of sight."

Ben said nothing, but he led the way, but stopped immediately when Owen began to hum _Happy Birthday To You_.

**. . . .**

"Jack…" Claret's voice trembled, because she knew what Jack was going to look like soon, she already had the imprint of his screams etched inside her mind even though he had yet uttered them. "You have to save Jim."

She begged him to save Jim, she didn't even know Jim, all she knew was that Ben wanted him saved and… and Claret did what Ben wanted done.

"What did they do to you?" Jack growled.

"They are not bad people," she said, thinking of Ben first meeting her in the jungle, of him telling her it was all going to be okay if she just followed his orders, and she did, she was.

He asked her why.

"Because, otherwise it would mean I'm crazy."

Claret left Jack inside his glass cage. She's said what she was supposed to say. Jack knew the ultimate betrayal now – he knew he'd been right about her all along.

She managed not to collapse right out there in the corridor, with Diane watching her and cameras on her, but when she arrived to her room she laid down on on the bed.

She didn't cry. No tears fell through her sobs. Her friends were captured.

Friends is a curious word, she thought later on as she collaborated with Janna for Flor's escape, she didn't feel like she was doing this for them, at all. _Friends. Friendly fire_. _They are friends getting caught in friendly fire._

Nothing got any better from putting words on it.

**. . . .**

"Ben's not going to believe me," Claret mumbled, mostly to herself when José said they were close to the Others' path.

"He'll have to," José said.

"I'm not as good at lying as you think I am," Claret said, glaring at him.

"You had them all fooled, didn't you?" José said. "Now, hit me."

Claret clenched her fist. "You could hit yourself harder than I could hit you."

"I doubt that," José said.

Claret knew he was innocent, but she didn't see that, she saw the face of a murderer in her mind, so she clenched her fist and punched him right on the nose.

José stumbled back, Claret was surprised by the force, and then he raised his own fist. She shrieked as he pulled put a gun – but not at her.

She spun around, quickly retreating to José's side.

"Bad time?" Jim Al asked sheepishly with his hands raised.

**. .**

Darkness fell was the saying; Owen thought it was seeping. It seeped in between the clouds, between the leaves, choking them. Sweat dripped down Owen's brow and she kept sweeping her hair away from her face, the temperature was rising despite the night. Locke and Ben seemed almost unfazed by the warmth as they trekked through the jungle in silence. Owen had tried to get them to sing-along, but it was clearly not their thing.

"Do you need another break?" Locke asked her. He slowed down his pace when Owen had stopped for the fourth time to pant heavily against a tree.

Owen glanced at Ben; of course the bastard had his eyebrows up in a fake innocence at her ordeal. "No," she said through her teeth, pulling herself together, and they continued on.

Locke suddenly held out an arm in her way, Owen almost walked into it in pure stubbornness, when she noticed gray soft… dust? on the jungle ground.

Locke bent down as Ben stepped over the circle of dust and took up a little between his fingers. "Ash," he said, sniffing in the air.

"You can smell ash?" Owen asked, but couldn't help it – she shivered, looking around at the circle of ash. She stepped over at the same time as Ben, and followed him between a pair of trees.

"No way," she said.

Behind the trees stood a cabin. In the middle of the freaking jungle. Dark, grim, rotting at the edges, small, and looking like a single huff and puff from a wolf could make the whole place fall apart. "He can't…" She stopped herself, cleared her throat, feeling it burn from lack of water. "Is this where he lives?"

Ben turned to her, one simply rise of his eyebrow. "Obviously. Listen... if we go in there, there's no turning back," Ben said. "Are you sure you want this?"

Locke made a sharp nod, Owen didn't hesitate. "Hell yeah."

Ben couldn't look more displeased even if Owen had just been declared President of the Island.

"So be it."

Ben walked up the stairs to the porch and even Owen was silent as he leaned closer to the door. "Jacob?" he said, looking like a caricature with his body bent forward and feet steady on the floor. "I'm here with Owen Chauncey and John Locke." He paused. "We're coming in now."

Owen and Locke exchanged a look when Ben opened the door, which made a loud creak. They followed him inside, Owen making sure she wasn't the last one in. Her eyes didn't get used to the dark immediately, she almost jumped when Locke went past her. She could make out the contours of jars by the window – a painting, was it a dog? and a chair, right in the middle. But one thing was for certain: the one-room cabin was empty but for them.

Ben walked over to the empty chair in the middle of the shack. "Jacob, here they are. Aren't you going to say hello, Owen?"

Owen turned around, looking at Locke who seemed to be just as confused as she was.

"What?" she asked.

Ben turned to the chair. "I told you she wouldn't."

"Who… what are you talking about?" Locke asked, moving closer to Owen who was staring at Ben to the empty chair, slowly understanding. "There's no one here," she said, loud, her voice screeching in the quiet.

"Can't you see him?" Ben asked, turned to the both of them.

"No," Owen bit back. "No, we can't see… whoever you think..."

"Jacob!" Ben shouted like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "He's sitting right here, in this chair!" He waved at it. Then turning down to the chair, "Yes, I know, but Owen insisted – she's very –"

"Stop it!" Owen yelled. She couldn't help it; Ben was talking to an empty chair like there was actually someone in it. The name of Jacob was now a ghost, he was nothing. There were no answers... of course there was no answer. What had she imagined? Had she imagined anything? Yet she felt disappointed. You can't feel disappointed when you've had no expectations. _Ben is mad_, she thought. She knew they were nuts, the Others, but more fanatic than actually mentally insane. Stop talking to it!

She'd shouted the last sentence out loud, Ben gave her a reproachful look.

"You wanted to meet Jacob, well here he is. This is the man who can answer –"

"There is no one in that chair!" Owen shouted. _Nothing. No answers_. "You're crazy!" Sweat was running down her back, but she was cold to the bones. "You're hallucinating…" She trailed off, eyes widening, thinking of when she herself had seen someone – someone who was dead and gone. She'd wakened up in the middle of the jungle, just like now, voice gone.

"You just made this all up…" Locke said, not noticing Owen's sudden silence.

"Excuse me?" Ben straightened up. Owen took a step back. Everything seemed darker now, but it couldn't be, not this early.

Locke started: "Stop –"

"Jacob, please," Ben said, turning to the empty chair again, "I can't hear him if you're gonna talk over what he's –"

"Shut up!" Locke shouted. "You're putting on a show for me?"

Owen felt like she was going to throw up. _Voice gone. Someone dead._

"Or do you..." Locke went on, "do you really think there's someone there?

There was a pause, there was a puff of air, and the shack didn't fall apart.

"I _know_ there's someone there," Ben said, eyes wide.

"Locke... John," Owen whispered, "Let's go, let's leave."

Locke gave her a surprised look. Hadn't he noticed that their breaths turned white in the air?

"You're pathetic," Locke said to Ben, turning to walk out of the door with Owen quickly behind him.

"_Help me_."

Both Owen and Locke stopped dead in their tracks.

"What did you just say?" Locke asked to Ben, but it hadn't been Ben's voice.

"Screw this," Owen said, picking out her flashlight from the bag, it was dark and if she was going to run through the jungle she wasn't doing it without seeing anything, she turned it on, "I'm leaving –"

The windows were beginning to shake – no, the whole ground shook. A jar suddenly exploded raining glass over the floor. Owen dropped her flashlight. Screaming she covered her head with her arms.

Ben leaned over the chair. "That's enough – you've had your fun!" Owen blinked, and he was thrown against the wall by something – _someone_ in that chair. She didn't stay to look if he was all right. She pushed Locke aside and ran out of the shack.

She tripped down the stairs and landed face-down on the ground. She almost crushed her nose, rolled to the side and wiped away tears at her eyes. She heard Locke's surprised shout, "Owen!" and a hand grasping her own.

She shrugged it away and struggled back to her feet alone, Locke tentatively standing beside her.

Ben closed the door to the cabin, eyes low.

"What was that?" Locke asked.

"That was Jacob," said Ben.

**. .**

_There couldn't have been anyone in that chair._

Owen was almost sure of it.

**. . **

"Well, this changes things." Claret said, when she'd tied Jim up in a neat and precise way, or so she thought she had. She was getting better at this tying people up business, and that thought was wrong for so many reasons.

Jim made noises. Jim made noises because he was gagged, but if he wasn't he'd probably said some dirty joke about this all, even Claret who didn't even know Jim very well (apart from begging Jack to save him) knew that about him.

"You begged for his life once," José said, looking down at Jim.

"I'm very well aware of that, thank you," Claret said, looking at someplace above José's shoulder. There was blood on his lips and nose and she didn't want to see it.

"This makes things easier," José said.

"Um, yes, of course it does."

"For me," José said.

Claret nodded, thoughts elsewhere. "Yes, of course – wait, what?"

Jim stopped making noises, and so he could listen more clearly to what they were saying.

"I do not need you assistance anymore."

Claret took a step forward. "_Assistance?_"

"We've helped each other as much as we possibly could already. Sean is safe. There is no reason –"

"What about me? What am I supposed to do?"

Jim made an agreeing noise. Claret looked at him, having forgotten he was there. He was an _Other_. She looked at José and understood.

"You were always with the Others," she said, voice trembling, all anger suddenly gone.

"Indeed," José said, he then dropped his gun suddenly on the ground and took a step back. "Oh no," he said unconvincingly.

Claret took the gun from the ground. "Ha!" she shouted. "I'm in charge now." She then noticed she was pointing it at herself, blushing furiously she turned it the other way. "Uh, let me go or I will shoot you."

"Then I must let you go."

Jim couldn't talk, but if he could, he would have cried out with what a bad performance it was.

**. . **

"Where is Ben?"

José had decided it was a better idea to knock Jim unconscious than to keep him awake. He had actually told Jim that he had been the worst prisoner he'd ever had. Which, for many reasons, was really worrying because first of this guy had kept many prisoners, and secondly – Jim was a delight.

Although he didn't feel very cheerful, waking to with blood in his mouth and Alex screaming at Richard and José pushing him to the ground.

"Take him over there," said Richard, pushing Alex away and going up to José. "Ben isn't here, but you can explain yourself to me."

Jim blinked, he mumbled something, his teeth hurt, his jaw hurt, but he couldn't feel his legs.

Colby – bloody Colby (what about all those poker nights? What about the other nights?) and _oh_.

Jim closed his eyes as Felicity wrapped an arm around him.

He woke up again, bound tight against a pole. This time he wasn't gagged.

"Now you've really made a mess," said Felicity, putting the water bottle to his mouth. Jim couldn't answer. His lips were too swollen. Felicity's hand flinched, as if she was to wipe his mouth, but Jim saw Colby stare at them and Felicity stood up.

"I can keep an eye on him," Felicity offered, after a moment's hesitation. Jim would have suggested how she could keep a closer eye on him. But Jim didn't feel like saying anything at all because if he did his teeth might fall out.

Colby raised his eyebrows. "You sure?" he asked. He walked closer to her, not touching, but it was with the ease of someone who had known someone for so long personal space was no longer an issue. Jim was not jealous. He'd just made the worst choice of his life. So he wasn't jealous.

"Yes." Felicity smiled and Colby gave her a pat on the shoulder as he walked past her.

"Oh, Jim," said Felicity, turning down to him again, it was the nicest thing she'd ever said to him.

"That's... the nicest..." He coughed.

"You're being dramatic," Felicity said, rolling her eyes. "You're not that beaten up."

"Hey!" said Jim. "I could be dying. Internal bleeding, ever heard of that? Are you that lousy of a doctor?"

"I'm not a doctor. And you're all right. Not in the face area though, might be a bit of scarring."

"WHAT?"

Felicity did not smile. He would pay good money to see her smile. But her lips twitched. Then she looked down. "I think they're going to kill you. Ben is. Jim – why the hell did you leave?"

"Why the hell did I come back is a better question." Because Maddy asked him to. And did Felicity know that? She looked at him like she usually looked at him, with distaste and pity.

"Maddy's not here," Felicity said. "To imagine that your downfall would be her. Are you really that predictable, Jim Al?"

He leaned forward as much as he could, and he could swear there was a loose tooth rattling around inside of him. "I trust her more than I trust anyone."

"And now you're going to die."

Jim leaned back, smiling. "Then how about a goodbye kiss?"

"Ew." Felicity stood up, and was about to leave the tent when she stopped, looking back at him. "I didn't know you could love a person like that, I didn't – I just figured you were the kind of person who couldn't. I know that's horrible to think of someone. But I guess – I didn't know anyone could love someone like you love her."

Jim shrugged. He had never taken his time to explain that what he felt for Maddy was not of the romantic kind, it hadn't ruined anything for him before, and what did it matter?

"Don't die for someone who wouldn't die for you," Felicity said, and left.

**. .**

"You have been unusually quiet, Owen," Locke said.

_Oh, excuse me for not feeling especially chatty after what we have been through_. Owen didn't say that. They had both seen her fall on her face already.

"Don't encourage her," Ben said behind him, eyes down like he didn't care much for the conversation, if you could call it that as Owen didn't answer him.

They'd all been quieter on the way back from the cabin. Dark had fallen but none had felt to set up camp, no one had suggested it either.

"This is not the way we came," Owen said. They all stopped, Locke looked around.

"She's right," he said. "Ben?"

Ben continued walking past them, almost hitting Owen's foot with his walking stick. "We're taking a little side-trip."

"Where?"

Ben disappeared behind a tree.

Owen looked at Locke, who shrugged and walked after Ben, though Owen could see that he was looking around with caution for anything that might appear, good that one of them cared.

Owen didn't care, well; she did, but not enough to do it herself. Her mind was filled with images from the cabin. Images that made her feel sick to the core. She now had nightmare material for months onward.

Wherever they were going couldn't make her feel worse than she was feeling now.

**. .**

_I will go mad here_, Claret thought.

Perhaps being alone was the worst of the options.

Do not go near the Forbidden Area, José had said.

She wouldn't.

She watched a butterfly land on the rock beside her. She thought about crushing it.

Claret raised her hand.

**. .**

"Owen," said Locke, and his voice was the darker tone of a warning. She stepped out of the trees into the clearing.

"What is it you –" She yelled, Locke grabbed her arm and pulled her back, saving her from falling into a pit of –

"Corpses!" she shouted. "Freaking rotting…" She took a deep breath. "_Corpses_."

"Yes, we can see that," Locke said. He turned to Ben as Owen shrugged his arm off her. "What is this?"

Owen leaned closer to the edge and peered down. The corpses were skeletons now, but the clothes hadn't all decayed yet.

"This is the last remaining members of the Dharma Initiative," he said.

Owen looked down at one of the skeleton's jumpsuits. "Hell no."

"Or heaven, depends how they lived their life."

Owen shot Ben a dark look.

"Why did you take us here?" Locke asked. Ben walked over to Locke's side. Owen was still peering over the side.

"I wanted to show you where I came from," he said.

Owen stood up on her knees, turning her head. "From a pit of corpses? Are you admitting to be the latent child of Satan?" She looked back at the mass grave, she swallowed hard, resisting the urge to throw up.

"You killed them all," she said. "You couldn't co-exist on the same piece of land so you decided to exterminate them. You are a mass-murderer –" She yelped when she felt a hand brush her belt, she swung around. Standing up she grabbed after the gun but it wasn't on her anymore it was on –

In Ben's hand.

When she blinked again, she saw the sky, trees swaying. She whimpered around rot and crumbling bones.

"_I don't want it!_"

"_Do you want to go into the pit with her?"_

She whimpered again.

"_I'll shoot you. I swear I'll shoot you._"

"_And then what?_"

"Shh, little one," a voice said in her ear. "Go to sleep."

Owen shut her mouth, closed her eyes, the trees swayed in the wind and bones cracked under her body.

**. . **

**Author's Notes:** Am I planning on continuing this story? Yes. But will I? Probably not. This update has been laying around for over a year and now, on wonderwall23's birthday, it has been released to the public.

I am sorry for abandoning this story. I told myself I would not become one of those writers who left a WIP. I had this story planned out. I knew who was going to die and who was going to live. Who the Oceanic Six would be (more like the Oceanic Six Plus Error Margin of +/-5) and what would happen to Aaron.

This story was my baby; this was what kept me going at times when I felt passive, numb, immobile to doing anything but the repetition of ordinary day activities. LOST was what made me care when I thought I had lost the ability to. It seems silly having this kind of affection for a TV show, but when I had lost the ability to care about anything it happened to be a TV show that brought it back (it's a story, just like the books one reads that bring joy, tears).

And when LOST ended I still had this.

I went through a bit of turmoil. I started a new school. I started... other things. And I couldn't write. I could barely write anything else either. And then when I got better I didn't have the time. That's the brutal honesty.

It's kind of mean that the chapter I release, the last chapter on this website, is a bit of a filler, doesn't explain many things, is an introduction to the last final chapters that will cover the season three ending's arc.

What would be my grand season three cliffhanger?

BUT THERE IS HOPE. SMALL TINY HOPE. I could answer any questions you have about your characters – other characters – if you want some closer. But I can't, because despite not having the time – I still can't let go of too much information. Because I think that maybe someday I'll finish this.

And if I do write more chapters, they will probably not be updated here, why clog up this site with a hopeless WIP? So if you want updates (no promises) please send me a message on here with your email or another way of contacting, so I can send it to the few readers who still look at this sometimes.

But this is not a promise there will be more chapters. And that if I can finally learn to let this story go and just tell you your character's fate – I will do that, if you want.

Namaste.


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